Muslim Women Archive | Page 49 of 79

Sabeeha Rehman

Ms. Sabeeha Rehman is the author of Threading My Prayer Rug: One Woman’s Journey from Pakistani Muslim to American Muslim.

She served as a Director of Interfaith Programs of the American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA) where she was a guest speaker on Islam at local events hosted by churches, synagogues, schools, and at community organizations such as the Jewish Community Center.

As a member of the Education Committee for the Sunday school, Ms. Rehman was involved in the design of the Islamic curriculum of the Sunday school, establishment of Muslim Summer Camp, and planning special events for young Muslims.

She is a Fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives (FACHE), and is an active member of its New York Chapter, Healthcare Leaders of New York. She was a founding member of the New York Metro Chapter of the National Autism Association and served as President between 2008 and 2011.

Chaiba Tallal

Chaiba Tallal was born in a small village near El-Jadida, Morocco. She was born into a poor family and was married at the age of thirteen. She was widowed by the time she was fifteen. By this time, she had a son, Talal, and was living in Casablanca, Morocco’s largest city and commercial center. After the death of her husband, Chaiba supported herself and her son by finding odd jobs cleaning houses as a maid.

Chaiba began painting with no formal training but soon her work caught the attention of Pierre Gaudibert, a Parisian museum director. He was immediately impressed by the bold colors and broad brush strokes that she used. Featuring women and Moroccan culture as inspiration, her painting reflected the vibrancy of Moroccan life. Gaudibert arranged for her to exhibit her paintings at the Museum of Modern Art, thereby transforming Chaiba into an internationally acclaimed painter.

Since then, her work has been featured in various exhibitions across Europe and Morocco. One of her paintings was chosen for the poster advertising the first International Women’s Art Exhibition in 1984. She also received a gold medal from the French Academic Society for Education and Encouragement for her contribution to the arts. Despite her Chaiba’s fame, Chaiba never forgot her roots and donated a portion of her painting sales to education initiatives for women in Morocco. Chaiba died in 2004.

Late Laleh Bakhtiar

Born to an American mother from Idaho and Iranian father in Tehran, Iran in 1938, Bakhtiar grew up in Los Angeles and Washington D.C. as a Catholic with her American mother. At the age of 19 she met Seyyed Hossein Nasr in Boston who told her that people would expect her to be a Muslim since her father was a Muslim. She said that having grown up in America she knew nothing about Islam. He said in a commanding voice: Well, learn. This was when her journey began. At the age of 24, she moved to Iran with her Iranian husband, an architect. She has three children and eight grandchildren. She began graduate work at Tehran University studying Quranic Arabic, Persian and Sufism. Divorced in 1976 while still living in Iran, she returned to the U.S. in 1988. She holds a BA in History, an MA in Philosophy, an MA in Counseling Psychology and a Ph.D. in Educational Foundations. She is also a Licensed Psychotherapist and Nationally Certified Counselor. As of 2020 Bakhtiar lives in Chicago, where she is president of the Institute of Traditional Psychology and Scholar-in-Residence at Kazi Publications.

She has translated and written more than 150 books on Islam, particularly many aspects of the Quran including how the Quran teaches critical thinking, Quranic psychology, Quranic commentaries and Sufism. Her translation of the Quran, published in 2007 called The Sublime Quran, is the first critical translation of the Quran into English by a woman. Laleh Bakhtiar’s translation takes on previous translations in presenting alternative meanings to many Arabic terms.

Where the context allows, she translates kāfirūn as “those who are ungrateful” instead of the common translations “unbelievers” or “infidels.” She also translates the Arabic word ḍaraba in Chapter 4, Verse 34, concerning treatment of a husband towards a rebellious wife, as “go away” instead of the common “beat” or “hit.” The English words “God” and “Mary” are used instead of the Arabic Allāh and Maryam. Bakhtiar believes these translations will bring greater interfaith understanding between Muslims and non-Muslims.

Necva Solak

Necva Solak is an attorney whose experience is in government and public policy. She is currently a litigator for the City’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development. She has also worked for the NYC Mayor’s Office as Assistant Counsel to implement procurement policy and reform. She earned her J.D. from New York Law School and received her B.A. in Political Science from Columbia University. Mrs. Solak’s background in government includes various internships with the Charities and Civil Rights Bureaus of the NYS Attorney General’s Office and for the Director of the Office of Public Liaison at the White House. She was a foreign policy research assistant at the Brookings Institution in Washington D.C. and a legal studies intern at the Center for Islamic Studies in Istanbul, Turkey. Mrs. Solak is fluent in Turkish and has published an article entitled, “Egypt’s Reservations to the U.N.C.E.D.A.W and Women’s Right’s in Egypt”, in the American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences.

‘Aishah bint Muhammad

‘Aishah bint Muhammad grew up in Damascus during a time when Islamic scholarship was flourishing. Born into the Banu Qudamah, a prominent Hanbali family in Damascus, she and her sister, Fatimah, began hadith training at an early age, which at the time was common for many women. She was taught from an early age by the famed hadith scholar, al-Hajjar. She outlived all of his other students and therefore became an important authority for those seeking his name in the line of transmission. She acquired several certificates for her studies, which allowed her to transmit several works from al-Bukhari and Muslim. As a prominent muhaddithah, she acted as an authoritative voice for narration for both male and female students and was well-known in Damascus and its surrounding environments. One of her most famous students was al-Hajar al-‘Askalani, known later to be one of the greatest Hadith scholars.

Her biography illustrates that not only was co-education common, but that female hadith transmitters had an important role in classical Islamic history. Aishah’s role as hadith transmitter outside the madrasa marks the success of religious education outside formal, male-dominated institutions.

Jahanara

Jahanara, was an early Sufi scholar and the eldest daughter of the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan and his wife Mumtaz Mahal. She was also known by alternative names, such as Fatima, Jahan Ara Begum Sahib, and Shahzadi. At the age of 17 years and upon the death of her mother, Jahanara succeeded to her mother’s position as the First Lady in the courts. Additionally, she became responsible for her siblings and the administration of the household.

Jahanara wrote several books about both the practices of Sufism and Sufi figures such as her Sufi teacher, Mulla Shah, of the Qadiriyya line. Her book on her initiation as a Sufi “bears witness to the profundity of her faith and mystical understanding.” ( Wiebke Walther, Women In Islam: From Medieval to Modern Times [Princeton: Marcus Weiner, 1993], 111.) She was also known for her interest in the arts, and she financed the building of several mosques and gardens.

When her brother Aurangzeb triumphed against their father in a war of succession in 1658CE, Jahanara accompanied Shah Jahan into prison until his death. She was then given her own home outside the prison until her own death.

Aisha bint Abu Bakr

Aisha bint Abu Bakr was the daughter of Abu Bakr, one of the Prophet Muhammad’s closest companions and the first Caliph after the Prophet’s death. Aisha was first betrothed to Jabir bin Mut’im at the age of five; however, to strengthen the bond between the Prophet and Abu Bakr, Aisha, his daughter who was unmarried and born a Muslim, was betrothed to the Prophet at an early age although they didn’t consummate the real marriage until after she had reached puberty.

One day, while in the desert, Aisha wandered off in search of her lost necklace, she was gone for a long enough time that the caravan had left with her husband and companions. Eventually, she was rescued by a young man and returned to safety. Because she had grown up in the public eye with the Prophet’s followers watching, she was on the receiving end of the troublemakers in the camp who leveled serious accusations against her character. She protested the rumors and declared her innocence but both her father and the Prophet remained silent leaving her despondent. Miraculously, she was cleared of all wrong-doing when the revelation in the Quran 24:12 came down.

“Why, when you heard it, did not the believing men and believing women think good of one another and say, “This is an obvious falsehood”? Why did they [who slandered] not produce for it four witnesses? And when they do not produce the witnesses, then it is they, in the sight of Allah, who are the liars….” (Q 24-12)

During their marriage, Aisha and the Prophet developed a very close relationship. To her great sorrow, she remained childless which enabled her to devote time and energy to acquiring knowledge. The Prophet had so much confidence in her he advised his community to learn half the knowledge of the religion from Aisha.

Aisha was brave, but also known to be hot tempered. In 656, 24 years after the death of the Prophet, she led an army against Ali the Fourth Caliph for failing to bring the killers of the Third Caliph to justice. She was defeated at the Battle of the Camel, causing a deep rift in the Prophet’s family. Some male scholars use this incident as justification for undermining women’s leadership. For the remaining 24 years of her life Aisha continued to spread knowledge of Islam through the preservation of 2,210 hadith and is bestowed with an honorific title of Mother of the Believers.

Slander

“How could such a simple rescue agitate

the gossips? Thirty long days,

rumors curdled the milk in my bowl

The neighbors’ words

-Fitna, falatya-“

Untold by Tamam Kahn

Fatima al-Fihri

Daughter of Mohammed al-Fihri, Fatima al-Fihri, also called Umm al Banine, ‘Mother of the Boys’, is known for creating the oldest academic degree-granting university in existence today, the University of Qarawiyyin.

Fatima and her family were among several families who moved from Tunisia to Morocco during the reign of the Moroccan King Idriss II.

After her husband and her brothers died, she and her sister Mariam inherited a large fortune. Both women wanted to devote their money to pious work that would benefit the community in order to receive the blessing of God. To this end, Fatima built the Al Qarawiyyin mosque, while Mariam built the Al-Andalus mosque. From the 10th to the 12th century, the Al Qarawiyyin mosque developed into a university which became an important centre of education and one of the first Islamic and most prestigious universities in the world.