The Real Fitnah Is the Reluctance of the Ulama to Move with Times

By Arshad Alam, New Age Islam 18 January 2023 Arshad Madani Recently Blamed Co-Education for Leading Muslim Girls Astray Main Points: 1. Jamiat Ulema’s president, Arshad Madani has stated that co-education is leading Muslim girls into apostasy 2. He underlined a grand conspiracy to make Muslims deviate from the path of Islam 3. Perhaps, he is perturbed by the happenings in Iran where huge numbers of girls are protesting against mandatory hijab 4. Madani’s statement are a sign of nervousness of the Ulama as a class 5. Increasingly, Muslim girls (and boys) are questioning the wisdom and relevance of traditional Islamic theology which is not a good sign for orthodox clerics like Madani ------ Maulana Arshad Madani ----- Apostasy Has Been Variously Defined In Islamic Theology. The Ambit Of The Term Is So Catholic That Almost Anything Can Be Construed As Apostasy. Raising Questions About God, The Prophet, The So Called Rightly Guided Caliphs, Or Even Supporting Another Apostate Can Be Declared Apostasy. ------- In its national executive meeting held on the 9th of this month, the Jamiat Ulama e Hind President Arshad Madani stated that Muslims girls are being led astray. He said that some are on the path of becoming apostates and that co-education has a big role to play in this development. The solution to this problem, he said, lies in opening more schools for girls so that they are saved from the greatest Fitnah on earth: co-education. How should we understand this regressive statement of Arshad Madani? One certainly understands that the Muslim community is under siege: there is an attack on their religion, culture, tradition, language and history. Under such circumstances it is normally understood that the community becomes defensive and clings to its traditions even more, rather than become progressive. However, looking at the history of the Ulama in this country and the positions they have taken, it can also be said that they have never really been interested in the question of progressive reforms. Whether it is the question of modernizing madrasas or doing even piecemeal changes in the Muslim Personal Law, the Ulama have always resisted any suggestion of progressive change. And this obstinacy has defined the Indian Ulama since Independence and even before that. Therefore, in order to understand the statement of Arshad Madani, one will have to get into the worldview of the Ulama. It is not that Madani is against the education of Muslim girls, as reported in sections of the press. His only problem is that girls should not get go to co-educational schools and colleges. That’s why Madani is arguing that there should be more schools specifically for girls. But why does he want Muslim girls to be educated? Is it because he wants them to go for higher education, get into the job market and become financially independent? That does not seem to be the case. According to his own rationality, he wants the community to establish more schools for girls so that they do not go astray and become apostates. The underlying emphasis therefore is that girls are becoming irreligious and the only way to stop this trend is by educating them more. From where does Madani get the idea that Muslim girls are becoming irreligious and that some of them are on the path of apostasy? He does not cite any data for his assertion. But we can surmise where he is coming from. Recent happenings in the Muslim world especially in Iran, where girls have come out in huge numbers to protest against the compulsory wearing of the hijab, seems to be on the reason. In India and the world over, more and more Muslim youth are questioning some of the fundamental postulates of Islamic religion as it has come to them through Islamic theology. According to one survey, more than 30 percent of Iranian and Saudi youth do not identify with Islam now. In India, there are cultural and ex-Muslim groups who are pointing out the rather obnoxious teachings in the name of Islam that have come to us over generations. They are arguing that opening up of Muslim minds will not be possible as long as the dominant received theology remains unquestioned. Then, there are reformist Muslim groups which are re-interpreting religious texts to suit contemporary demands. All this must have an effect on the Muslim youth, both girls and boys. One cannot measure the impact of such efforts in forcing an internal debate within Muslims but what is clear is that it has certainly unnerved the Ulama. Madani belongs to this class and hence is only highlighting the anxiety of his own ilk at such a development within the Indian Muslim society. The power of the Ulama remains intact only till the time the Muslim masses do not start questioning them. The Ulama are now perhaps feeling that difficult questions are being directed at them, hence the present anxiety. Since Madani remains invested in Muslim society, he must have experienced this new trend and that’s why he has spoken up for the need to counter what he terms as apostasy. Apostasy has been variously defined in Islamic theology. The ambit of the term is so catholic that almost anything can be construed as apostasy. Raising questions about God, the Prophet, the so called rightly guided caliphs, or even supporting another apostate can be declared apostasy. In short, till the time Muslims do not question any of the outmoded wisdom of Islamic theology, he will be out of harm’s way. But the minute she starts questioning the status quo and tries to locate the problem of Muslim stagnancy in Islamic theology, she is in dangerous terrain. But how does one critique the Islamic theology without questioning the model on which it is based: the Prophetic code and the conduct of earliest Muslims. The law of apostasy therefore is nothing but the most potent tool in the hands of the orthodox Ulama to wield control over the masses, especially dissenters. Without this law, they cannot exercise their power. Hence Madani’s concern and fear is understandable: if Muslims are becoming apostates, who will then listen to the Ulama? But why single out girls for this special treatment? The Iranian protests might have something to do with it. Also, because the Ulama know that for their religion to prosper and their reign unquestioned, women have to see merit in what they are saying. If they don’t, then they have to be controlled. After all, women’s bodies are one of the first sites through which the Ulama exercise their power. It is women who raise the future generation. Hence if you control them, you control generations of Muslims. However, many Muslim women are now questioning what the religion of Islam has to offer to them. They get half the share in property, are expected to be obedient wives and despite doing all this, have nothing for them in the Muslim Jannah. According to Madani, the women who are asking such questions are on the road to apostasy. Hence his suggestion that more girls’ schools should be open to arrest his process. Thus, although Madani wants Muslim girls to gain education, it is not that he is arguing for a secular liberal education. He thinks that Muslim girls, when they know about the correct teachings of Islam, would stop raising such uncomfortable questions about their religion. He thinks that by meeting boys from other religions in schools, Muslims girls are losing their faith. Perhaps these boys are ‘poisoning’ the minds of Muslim girls. Madani may also be reflecting to news reports in the Urdu Press about Muslim girls marrying Hindu boys. In one of such reports published in the Inquilab, 66 Muslim girls were converted in Mani Ashram in Bareilly during the period 2013-2022. The person who runs the Ashram told the newspaper that for such marriages, he first does Shuddhi of the Muslim girl, that is, he converts them to the Hindu faith. One doesn’t really know the veracity of this news report as the district administration feigns ignorance of the whole issue, but such reports must have played in the minds of Madani before giving out his statement. But then, people like Madani should ask themselves: if Muslims are free to convert others, why then the reverse should be a matter of such consternation? Madani possibly may be right in thinking that such inter-religious alliances start through friendships at the school or the college. And hence, according to his logic, it is co-education which is to be blamed for such a sorry state of affairs. But Madani is wrong to think that if they are put in all girls’ schools, the threat of becoming critical Muslims will disappear. What if Hindu girls start to poison the minds of Muslim girls? What if they start telling them that Hindu girls now have an equal share in property? What if they tell Muslim girls that Hindu women have the right to give divorce? What if they say that their witness is not considered half as that of men? How is Madani going to stop all that? But what if it is not just an all-girls school but also an all-Muslim school? May be this is what Madani has in mind when he talks about the grand conspiracy to lead Muslim girls astray. Of course, Muslims are the most innocent community on the planet! Everyone else is planning against them; the Christians, the Jews and now the Hindus all want to eliminate Islam because only Islam is the true religion. In order to minimize the influence of these alien ideologies, it is better that Muslim girls be educated in all Muslim schools. But even this is not going to help Madani. How is he going to curb the influence of books that Muslim girls will read in schools and colleges, some of which will lead them to question the received Islamic orthodoxy? But how do we even know that Madani thinks of education in secular liberal terms? After all, his Deoband Madrasa banished the study of philosophy and other rational sciences long years ago and still thinks they were correct to do so. So perhaps, what Madani is basically saying is that Muslims girls should not just study in all Muslim school but should also not be exposed to philosophy or science of any kind. If you think this is Talibanesque, you are wrong. It is our very own, home grown Deobandism, from where the Taliban borrowed the idea. Alas! Even putting such restrictions is not going to help Madani. Thanks to modern technology, production and dissemination of knowledge is no longer confined to schools and universities. Through various forums, informed discussions on Islam’s positives and negatives are happening online which anyone can access with a smart phone. What is Madani going to do about that? Debar Muslim girls from having smart phones? Perhaps, if they have state power, they would do so. But that is not a possibility anymore. The likes of Madani should stop thinking about how to control Muslim lives, especially those of girls. Sections of Muslims are on an inexorable march towards rationality and it will be very difficult to arrest this phenomenon. The only way in which the Ulama can remain relevant is by changing themselves! And trying to remove the many contradictions which inform Muslim lives under conditions of modernity. It is not co-education that is a problem; it is the antediluvian obstinacy of the Ulama that constitutes the real Fitnah today. ----- A regular contributor to NewAgeIslam.com, Arshad Alam is a writer and researcher on Islam and Muslims in South Asia. URL: https://newageislam.com/the-war-within-islam/fitnah-reluctance-ulama-madani-girls/d/128904 New Age Islam, Islam Online, Islamic Website, African Muslim News, Arab World News, South Asia News, Indian Muslim News, World Muslim News, Women in Islam, Islamic Feminism, Arab Women, Women In Arab, Islamophobia in America, Muslim Women in West, Islam Women and Feminism