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Muslims Debate Female Circumcision « Camels With Hammers
The reactions of the women in the background are fascinating.
I find what the man is saying more fascinating. It’s interesting that this lecture aired in 2006, seeing that it was a year later that Al-Azhar University declared female genital mutilation prohibited. If this man is a scholar from one of the most respected Islamic institutions in the world, then why is he talking about female honor in this lecture? Isn’t it time to step away from blaming sexual misconduct on women and extract a universal religion away from the blemished Cultural Islam? So this man shows statistics of women being more chaste after circumcision, yet Egypt is known to make great profit from Gulf Arabs with sex tourism.
This might make sense seeing that, according to their laws, a man who is caught with a prostitute will not be incarcerated, but his testimony will be use to justify conviction of the prostitute. My Imam usually gives passionate speeches against Middle Eastern cultural practices that define family honor as something analogous to female chastity, but this concept of honor is ubiquitous in Muslim communities around the world. Unfortunately, this patriarchal culture seems to be justified with hadith and Qur’anic ayats.
How does one steer away from this version of Islam? How can we make Islam a Universal religion that advocates human rights?
As a side note, here’s a site that justifies female circumcision to enhance sexual pleasure for the woman.
Interesting debate.
What I take from it is that it shows exactly why within only 50 years after death of Prophet s.a.w.w. we changed Islam to make it more men-driven and started subjugating the women.
This man is actually talking about “women” as if he knows women more than they know themselves! The reaction of the lady opposing his views and above all the women in the audience shows his sheer lack of knowledge.
I remember reading quite many Ahadiths from Sihah-e-Sita on this topic. I do not remember any one of them which shows that this was ever done in Arab by Arabs! I can actually recall one exactly where the practitioner was an African woman (most probably Ethiopian) who had come over for trade and when Prophet s.a.w.w. was briefed on what she does, he expressed surprise on it and later asked her to be gentle and not cut too much (literal meanings). Further showing that the practice was never even “Arab” in nature!
Prophet s.a.w.w’s approval or disagreement should be also looked in the way that, when he was once offered a roasted desert salamander, he didn’t like to eat it but he also didn’t term it haram (forbidden). But seeing that no other Ashab (r.a.) present ate that meat.
Finally the lady raises a very important point. Why wasn’t any of the Prophet s.a.w.w’s daughters circumcised? To which I didn’t see the “Sheikh” responding!
I am also amazed that Sheikh instead of asking the lady, who called him, to wear less tight jeans asked her to go ahead with circumcision!
In a way I am glad that it is still in Africa where it is a cultural practice rather than a religious practice. Though sadly it is done within Dawoodi Bohra Muslim community which have a small footprint in Pakistan but live largely in India.
