ISLAMIC FEMINISM ATTITUDE TOWARDS QURAN AND SUNNAH TEXTS -POLYGAMY TEXTS AS A SAMPLE-: A CRITICAL STUDY

Abstract

This research addresses the attitude of Islamic feminism regarding the texts of Quran and Sunnah, with the representation of the texts indicating the legality of polygamy. The importance of the research is that the Islamic feminist trend is more harmful than other feminist trends; because it attributes its ideas to the religion and calls for the purification of Sharia from what the patriarchal system has introduced in it, that inflicts transgression and oppression against women. Thus, the rate of acceptance of these ideas and their spread among Muslim women increases compared to the feminist trends, which claims that Sharia has oppressed women and deprived them of their rights. In this study, the researcher took the inductive approach represented in extrapolating a number of Islamic feminist writings, then analyzing and criticizing them. The researcher concluded with the following results: That the beginning of the Islamic feminist trend was at the end of the last century AD, and Iran was one of its first and important stages, and Its spread increased after the events of September 11, due to Western support for everything that contributes to dismantling the courts of the Islamic religion and its rooted origins - including the position on women's issues - which they see as a threat to freedoms and world peace. Islamic feminism differs from secular feminism in terms of reference and means, but this difference did not cause a conflict or enmity between the two trends, the Islamic feminism believes that the truth of the meanings of the Qur’an cannot be certain, and therefore it must be interpreted in accordance with the universal commonality and human rights. Regarding their attitude towards Sunnah, it is very selective such that they accept only the hadiths in support of their discourse while discarding what opposes it. Although Islamic feminists acknowledge the decisiveness of the Quranic textual evidence regarding the Islamic legality of polygamy, they argue that such legality is only valid in very narrow scenarios, or that the legality itself is abrogated either by other textual evidence or the evolution of the legal system that prohibits polygamy.