Our discussion in class about women and their protectors in Ancient Arabia intrigued me. Why does it always seem to be that women appear vulnerable and lost without a man? I recently watched a movie called
Sabha: A Love Story, which is about an unhappy Muslim woman, Sabha, who still lives with her family. Her brother is the head of the house, and he basically controls her life. The family is always telling her that she needs to find a husband. Sabha feels suffocated and trapped under the "power" of her brother and her family's ways. In Muhammad's time, marriage was a tool used for power and protection. Why can't marriage just be about love? Is that too much to ask?
With this in mind, I now realize that Sabha's brother could be seen as her protector. Like discussed in class, Arabian woman needed male protectors to prevent them from being targets of slavery and other possible dangers. In the modern day love story, Sabha's brother didn't need to protect her from slavery. However, his strict ways that appeared too harsh in Sabha's eyes were really just an act of love. He wanted what was best for his sister, even if she didn't see it as that way. In this case, and in the cases of the Arabian women in Muhammad's time, do you think it was better to have "protected love" or allow women to live without protectors?
The question of whether it is better for women in Islamic countries (both historically and today) to marry for protection or to live without that protection requires something of a two-sided answer. While in an ideal situation, or even a situation close to ideal, of course women should choose for themselves who and when (if ever) to marry, the dangerous and sexist societal circumstances in Muhammad's time meant that women were frequently better off marrying for protection. Most people, and therefore most women, prefer living in less-than-ideal circumstances to dying or living in totally miserable circumstances, so marrying for protection would have been a preferable alternative one's enemies, or simply unscrupulous people, killing or taking advantage of one. The societal circumstances of today's world, however, are in many cases less harsh than those of Muhammad's time. This opens up the possibility of reforming the remaining sexist aspects of society, and therefore making it possible for women not to marry for protection out of necessity.
ReplyDeleteP.S. I also posted this on my blog if you'd rather read it there.