From a blog I just discovered, an incredible post on how the promise of virgins in paradise influences the Muslim man’s ideas of women on Earth.
Go read and comment over there. And check out the rest of the blog.
UPDATE: To be clear, I wrote “the Muslim man’s ideas of women on Earth” because the post is specifically about Muslim men, not because these perceptions of women are unique to Muslim men. I don’t buy the idea that Islam somehow “creates sexism” any more than I buy the idea that Christianity or Judaism do, or that misogyny is inherent to religion itself. I think that religions can re-instate existing sexist ideas, and that varying interpretations of religious texts are often attempts to give misogyny religious grounding. Religious belief has done a lot of good. It can build communities, it’s tied into individual identity, it can inspire creation and beauty, and it can offer people something to hang on to when they otherwise might not have much else. It does a lot of good. But like everything else, it is subject to cultural context; religions were formulated within particular contexts, and they continue to shift and change given the space they occupy today. Religion is not static; it is not always “good” or “bad.” It both reflects and influences.
So my linking to a critique like Eteraz’s should not be interpreted as “anti-Muslim” or anti-religious. I am neither. He is picking out a specific, much-emphasized aspect of Islam and asking what this means for the men who adhere to that religion. Christian scholars have done similar things with their religion’s focus on Mary’s virginity and the sexual expectations laid on Christian women. The basic grounding of Islam and Christianity and Judaism are remarkably similar. The ideals laid out in most of the world’s major religions all overlap, and include the same basic premises. What Ali says here is not only applicable to Islam, but he focuses on Islam because that is a faith with which he has much experience. It would be a mistake to attribute sexism and misogyny to religion itself, and especially to one particular religion. The relationship between religion and culture is a complex one, and I apologize if my very short original post led anyone to believe that I think misogyny is an inherent part of Islam, that I think Eteraz’s observations are unique to Islam, or that I believe religion in general to be a negative thing.
UPDATE 2: I want to further be clear that none of what I wrote in the preceeding paragraph is meant to represent Eteraz’s views. He speaks for himself on his own blog, and my interpretations of his post are just that — mine.