RIGHTS OF WOMEN IN ISLAM: 3rd Edition - Tapa dura

Elaborate and thorough, this overview studies countless aspects regarding women's relationship to Islam--from their status in the pre-Islamic period and various traditions surrounding marriage to forms of divorce during that period, dower, and customs regarding slave-girls. It goes on to deal with the post-Islamic era, the Qur'anic concept of women's rights in inheritance, the custody of children, polygamy, and rights to property. With extensive quotes from the Qur'an and Sunnah, this study attempts to arm Muslim women with Islamic arguments for their empowerment, exploring clear Qur'anic injunctions on gender equality and the man-made shari'ah formulations that reduced women to a status of inferiority.

This book is a long-overdue reassessment of women's rights in Islam which have long been widely misunderstood and misinterpreted. The fundamentalists, unmindful of the social context in which Quranic verses on the subject were written, have tried to portray men as superior human beings to women. The author, a renowned scholar, has sought to set the record straight by reinterpreting the women's rights in the true Quranic spirit. He argues, quite convincingly, that the Holy Book gives equal rights to both the sexes and that it does not discriminate between them in respect of personal, democratic, and human rights. An activist in women's struggle for equality, he has provided Muslim feminists with a powerful weapon for their fight for equality with men. He examines in depth the question whether in a secular society Muslim Personal Law needs any change, and, if so, in which direction reforms should be undertaken. The related issue of introduction of a common civil code, doing away with religiously discriminating laws, is considered.