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Wife Beating in Islamic Law: Difference between revisions
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==Islamic scriptures and wife-beating== | ==Islamic scriptures and wife-beating== | ||
{{Main|Qur'an, Hadith and Scholars:Wife Beating | {{Main|Wife Beating in the Qur'an}} | ||
See Also:[[Qur'an, Hadith and Scholars:Wife Beating]] | |||
===Wife-beating in the Qur'an=== | ===Wife-beating in the Qur'an=== | ||
====(4:34) 'Beat them'==== | ====(4:34) 'Beat them'==== | ||
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Tabari, a source Islamic scholars view as being considerably less reliable than the sahih hadiths, also reports that Ibn Abbas narrated that Muhammad at some point instructed that Men should only beat their wives with the twig-like device known as a ''miswaak''. Many doubt the reliability of this report, which appears to contradict the overall message of the hadith literature, but it is equally possible that Muhammad at some point actually endorsed this view, only to finally adopt the position indicated in the farewell sermon. | Tabari, a source Islamic scholars view as being considerably less reliable than the sahih hadiths, also reports that Ibn Abbas narrated that Muhammad at some point instructed that Men should only beat their wives with the twig-like device known as a ''miswaak''. Many doubt the reliability of this report, which appears to contradict the overall message of the hadith literature, but it is equally possible that Muhammad at some point actually endorsed this view, only to finally adopt the position indicated in the farewell sermon. | ||
Critics have also noted what they describe as the sheer absurdity of the qualification found in the report and suggest that it could hardly be that God would leave out such an important qualification from the verse which, read in isolation, simply instructs men to beat their wives. To do so, critics suggest, would be a serious lack of judgement on God's part. Critics have also ridiculed the absurdity of the practice itself - what is the purpose, they ask, of tapping one's wife with a twig? And why would ''this'' prove effective if admonition of one's wife and abandoning her in bed had proven ineffective - surely tapping someone with a twig cannot be more compelling than either of these measures? Such a practice, critics conclude, is, at worst, a humiliating and patronizing symbolic gesture (having no place in polite society), or, at best, a fiction generated in the minds of later Muslims (that is, 7th, 8th, or 9th century Muslims attributing this idea, retroactively, back to Ibn Abbas) who were having a hard time reconciling the conflicting imperatives of an early Islamic tradition which at once taught Muslims to be kind to one another - and to beat their wives. | Critics have also noted what they describe as the sheer absurdity of the qualification found in the report and suggest that it could hardly be that God would leave out such an important qualification from the verse which, read in isolation, simply instructs men to beat their wives. To do so, critics suggest, would be a serious lack of judgement on God's part. Critics have also ridiculed the absurdity of the practice itself - what is the purpose, they ask, of tapping one's wife with a twig? And why would ''this'' prove effective if admonition of one's wife and abandoning her in bed had proven ineffective - surely tapping someone with a twig cannot be more compelling than either of these measures? Such a practice, critics conclude, is, at worst, a humiliating and patronizing symbolic gesture (having no place in polite society), or, at best, a fiction generated in the minds of later Muslims (that is, 7th, 8th, or 9th century Muslims attributing this idea, retroactively, back to Ibn Abbas) who were having a hard time reconciling the conflicting imperatives of an early Islamic tradition which at once taught Muslims to be kind to one another - and to beat their wives. | ||
==Early and modern Islamic authorities on wife-beating== | ==Early and modern Islamic authorities on wife-beating== | ||