Book review: Unveiling the Hidden History of Women
Ulema
Name of the Book: Banat-e Islam Ki Dini Wa Ilmi
Khidmat ('The
Religious and Intellectual Contributions of Muslim
Women')
Author: Maulana Qazi Athar Mubarakpuri
Publisher: Islamic Book Foundation, 1781 Hauz
Suiwalan, New Delhi 110002
Year: 2006
Pages: 104
Price: Rs. 40
Reviewed by: Yoginder Sikand
Books in English and Urdu on Muslim history rarely, if
ever, mention the role and contribution of numerous
remarkable Muslim women scholars. Yet, as the author
of this fascinating monograph, the late Qazi Athar
Mubarakpuri (1916-1996), points out, early Muslim
history records many such women, several of whose
names are mentioned in contemporary Arab chronicles.
Indeed, he asserts, many of these texts had separate
chapters devoted to such women. Some early Arab Muslim
writers even penned separate books dealing with women
scholars.
Notable among these, Mubarakpuri mentions, are Asharat
ul-Nisa by Imam Tabari, a book by the same name
authored by Hafiz Abul Qasim Sulaiman bin Muhammad bin
Ahmad Shami, Balaghat ul-Nisa by Ibn Taifur, Akhbar
ul-Nisa by Imam Ibn Qayyim, Adab ul-Nisa by Ibn
Jawziya, Kitab ul-Nisa by Imam Musalmah bin Qasim
Andalusi, Ashar ul-Nisa by Allama Marzbani and Nuzhat
ul-Jalsa fi Ashar ul-Nisa by the well-known Imam
Suyuti.
In this monograph, Mubarakpuri provides us glimpses of
some of these early Muslim women scholars, for the
most part Arab and Persian. Many of them were
recognized for their knowledge of various Islamic
sciences, a remarkable contrast to today where few
such Muslim women scholars exist, and where often it
is assumed that religious scholarship is a male
domain. The question thus arises that if early Muslim
women could achieve such scholarly heights, inspired
by their own faith, what is to stop their sisters
today from trodding the same path?
Many of these early Muslim women scholars were experts
in the science of Hadith, traditions attributed to the
Prophet. These included several wives of the Prophet,
numerous other Sahabiyat or women who had seen the
Prophet, as well as others in succeeding generations.
These women narrated Hadith reports from various
sources, including their male and female relatives,
and several of them were considered as venerable
authorities even by male scholars. Thus, for instance,
Mubarakpuri tells us that Umra bint Abdur Rahman
Ansariya of Medina was so well-known for her knowledge
of Hadith that the Caliph Umar bin Abdul Aziz advised
Abu Bakr bin Muhammad bin Hazm to learn the subject
from her. The daughter of one Tayyeb bin Keran
delivered lectures to men and women in the famous
Masjid al-Andalus in Morocco, a mosque constructed by
a woman. Some female scholars would also hold special
learning sessions or majalis for women alone. Many of
these were also Sufis in their own right, such as Umm
Ahmad Zuleikha of Ghazni, Taj ul-Nisa bint Rustam of
Isfahan, Fatima bint Husain Raziya, and Fatima of
Nishapur, a noted commentator (mufassira) of the
Quran, who was considered by the famous Sufi Hazrat
Zul Nun Misri as a 'saint' and as his teacher.
Some women scholars of Hadith were so famous that they
attracted male students from far off-lands to learn
from them even when they had reached a ripe and
venerable age. Thus, Umm Muhammad bin Zainab Ahmad bin
Umar Maqdisia would deliver lectures on Hadith till
the age of ninety, including while on her travels to
Makkah and Egypt. Likewise, Umm Ahmad Zainab bin Makki
Harraniya taught her students till she attained the
age of ninety-four. Ulliya bint Hasan, mother of the
famous Hadith scholar Ibn Aliya, attracted shaikhs and
scholars of fiqh or Muslim jurisprudence from Baghdad
for regular intellectual exchanges, as did, so Ibn
Jawziya records, the famous Muhadditha or female
Hadith scholar Reta bint Abdullah. Hafsa bint Sirin
was considered to be such a reputed scholar that Ayas
bin Muawiya asserted that he had 'not seen a scholar
whom could be considered superior to her'. Social
status did not always constitute a bar for such
intellectual exchange and learning between the
genders, Mubarakpuri suggests. Thus, Humaira, a woman
slave of Abul Fatah bin Abul Fawares, narrated Hadith
reports to numerous men. Aliya bint Hasan of
Basra,another slave woman, was the teacher of numerous
male ulema.
Several women scholars gave sanads or certificates to
transmit Hadith to their male students. These included
Umm Muhammad Asma bint Muhammad bin Salim, Umm
Muhammad Fatima bint Ibrahim, Karima bint Abdul Wahhab
and a host of others whose names now lie buried in
relatively inaccessible Arabic tomes. Just as many
such women had male students, numerous early Muslim
women scholars studied from venerable male shaikhs.
Thus, Mubarakpuri narrates, Umm Muhammad Khadijah of
Baghdad would attend Imam Ahmad bin Hanbal's lectures
and he gave her special attention. Some women
students, Mubarakpuri relates, were granted the
coveted title of Khatimat ul-Ashab, given to the last
student of a shaikh who narrated a Hadith report from
him or her. These included Fatima bint Khatib Izzuddin
Ibrahim Maqdisi, the Khatimat ul-Ashab of Shaikh
Ibrahim bin Khalil and Umm Hani Affifa bint Ahmad
Farqania Isfahani, student of Abdul Wahid Alashaj.
These and numerous other women were among the many
women students of male religious scholars, a testimony
to the times when it was indeed possible for women to
study religion from men, something quite inconceivable
in Muslim religious circles in large parts of the
world today.
This early period of Muslim history suggests that
women scholars, in many places, did enjoy considerable
physical mobility to pursue their scholarly interests.
Like their male counterparts, numerous women scholars
left their homes and traveled to far-off lands in
order to study Hadith from noted scholars. Thus,
Mubarakpuri tells us, Umm Husain Hujiya bint Ahmad
Mahamiyya left her native Nishapur for Baghdad to
learn Hadith from scholars there, and among her
students was the noted Shaikh Abul Husain Muhammad.
Umm Ali Taqiya bint Abol Farj Qays bin Ali traveled
from Baghdad to Egypt, where she spent considerable
time studying with Imam Abu Tahir Ahmad bin Muhammad
in Alexandria. Zuleikha bint Ilyas of Ghazni ventured
to the Hijaz to learn Hadith and then shifted to
Persia. Umm Ahmad Fatima bint Nafisuddin Muhammad bin
Husain of Hama, Syria, traveled to Egypt to study
there. Karima bint Ahmad of Khorasan shifted to Makkah
where she
eventually became a teacher, including among her
students the noted historian Khatib Baghdadi, who
studied the collection of Hadith by Imam Bukhari under
her.
Mubarakpuri writes that several early Muslim women
were authors of tomes on a range of religious
subjects, but laments that many of their books are no
longer available today. Ajiba bint Hafiz Muhammad bin
Abu Ghalib Baqadariyya of Baghdad is said to have
written a ten-volume book describing her numerous
teachers; Umm Muhammad Fatima Khatun bint Muhammad
Khatba of Isfahan authored several books, including
the five volume al-Ramuz Min al-Kanuz; Umm Muhammad
Shahida bint Kamaluddin Umar put together Hadith
reports in the form of numerous books; Aisha bint
Ammara bin Yahya of Bujaya in Africa copied in her
handwriting a book that ran into eighteen volumes;
Khadijah bint Shaikh Shihabuddin
of Mecca penned numerous texts and corresponded with
several ulema. And so on.
The word 'fatwa' is now so carelessly hurled about and
projected as a tool used by unscrupulous men for
suppressing their womenfolk, but this, Mubarakpuri
suggests, was not how it was understood in early
times. In fact, he notes, several women scholars
regularly provided fatwas in their recognized capacity
of Muftia or female muftis. Thus, he quotes the noted
Imam Qayyim as having related that twenty-two
Sahabiyat were well-known for their authority in
matters related to fatwas and fiqh. Fatima, a noted
faqiha or female scholar or fiqh, would sign fatwas
along with her father, the noted Hanafi scholar Shaikh
Alauddin of Samarkand, and her husband, Allauddin
Kasami; the Shafi scholar Ummatul Wahid Sittita,
daughter of Qazi Abu Abdullah bin Ismail Mahamali,
offered fatwas along with the scholar Shah Abu Ali. Of
her Ibn Jawziya remarked, 'She was a great scholar and
[the one]
who had best memorized Shafi texts.
Mubarakpuri provides details of numerous women
scholars who had memorized the Quran. Several others
had memorized other voluminous texts. Thus, the
daughter of Shaikh ul-Islam Imam Abu al-Faraj Abdul
Wahid bin Muhammad of Shiraz had memorized the entire
30-volume commentary on the Quran by her father. Imam
Sirajuddin Abdur Rahman bin Umar Dani Hanbali's blind
daughter, when asked about any Hadith in the Sihah
Sitta, a collection of Hadith reports recognized by
most Sunnis, would reply immediately, so prodigious
was her memory. Other women wrote the entire Quranic
text by hand, and Ibn Fayyaz notes that in just a
single locality in Cordoba there were 170 women who
did that.
Several women scholars, Mubarakpuri tells us, made
their mark in subjects other than strictly religious,
although these too were related to the transmission of
the religious tradition in different ways. Maryam bint
Abu Yaqub of Andalusia, a pious woman who had
completed the Haj pilgrimage, taught Arabic poetry and
literature to many, including male, students; Khadijah
bint Shaikh Shihabuddin Naviri of Makkah was a Sufi
and a scholar of Hadith, besides being a well-known
poetess; Umm al-Fazl Fatima bitn Hasan bin Ali of
Baghdad was a renowned calligrapher and was regarded
for her skill in this art as the 'teacher of her age',
being invited by a Muslim ruler to write up a treaty
that he had entered into with the Christian Emperor of
Constantinople, for which she was paid a hefty sum of
a thousand dinars. All this, of course, not being
quite the sort of treatment that Muslim women scholars
would receive today from most of their male peers, who
might not even acknowledge, leave alone reward, their
scholarship.
In addition, Mubarakpuri narrates, numerous pious
women in this early phase of Muslim history made
valuable contributions by establishing institutions
for the transmission of Islamic knowledge. Ghalima
bint Muhammad of Spain, who received the title of
'al-Mualima' or 'the teacher', regularly delivered
lectures to numerous students, including males, in
various subjects and established a special madrasa for
girls, as did another Spanish woman scholar Maryam
bint Abu Yaqub Shalbia; Umm Husain, daughter of Qazi
Shihabuddin Tabari of Makkah, was a faqiha and a Sufi,
and among her various charitable works was the
establishment of a madrasa for orphans; Fatima bint
Muhammad bin Abdullah constructed the famous Jamia
Qaravin in Fez, Morocco, and her sister set up the
Jamia al-Andalusia mosque next to it; and in Makkah,
Mubarapuri goes on, there were several Sufi lodges for
women and the poor, especially those who had come from
far-off lands, that were established by women.
Unveiling, as it so brilliantly and succinctly does,
the hidden history of Muslim women ulema, this book
makes a valuable contribution to our admittedly
extremely limited understanding of gender relations in
early Muslim societies, a subject of considerable
debate and controversy today. Since the author was a
traditional alim who had studied and had taught in
traditional Indian madrasas, his work is all the more
remarkable. Yet, precisely because of this, the book
lacks a certain academic rigour. The author supplies
no references, and the details that he provides of the
remarkable women whom he lauds are sketchy, limited
just to their names and their works, without telling
us more about their lives. That obviously limits the
merit of this otherwise fascinating study, and calls
for more detailed studies of an aspect of Muslim
history that urgently demands more research and
scholarly attention.
Sukhia Sab Sansar Khaye Aur Soye
Dukhia Das Kabir Jagey Aur Roye
The world is 'happy', eating and sleeping
The forlorn Kabir Das is awake and weeping
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