However, in spite of appearances to the contrary, never has sexuality been such a problem. Indeed the sexual liberation of women creates, as if by way of reaction, a sort of sexual nostalgia on the part of men that sharpens and revives uterine memories. Backward looking, even in matters of the faith, expresses an undeniable desire to return to the womb. The fiqh, the sunna, the golden age are ultimately so many substitutes for what Ferenczi calls thalassa. Traditional religious knowledge is an ‘ocean’ in which we still like to submerge ourselves. Is this again an instance of flight into religion? It is, in any case, certainly a flight into a sacralized past.
For the flight into sexuality cannot be other than a fear of oneself and of the world. Ostensibly the search for the ‘harem’, ‘orgies’ and provocatively overt homosexuality express a desire to stay where one is. There is something infantile in the desire to create a scandal. Certainly sexual maturity and therefore psychological maturity are today two of our most serious preoccupations. Anxiety and fear are merely signs of our inability to adapt to one another. The sexual crisis in interpersonal relations, like the crisis in faith, is a rupture in the dialogue with God.
On these two very precise points I must admit the limitations of my knowledge. In the absence of precise empirical and theoretical research, which would avail itself of the resources of psychoanalysis and sociology, I am unable to formulate any hypotheses. In the light of the brief analyses to be found in this chapter it would seem that sexuality and religion, after providing for centuries a sort of happiness, peace and integration, are today being transformed into types of alienation. Reduced to itself, deprived of the ethic of marital affection, of the lyrical vision of life that the Muhammadan view of the world was able to give it, sexuality today is no more than a ‘commerce’ of the body without the participation of the spirit. Deprived of its myths, its taboos, it has also become dehumanized and alienating. The notions of iḥsān, zinā, and nikāḥ enveloped sexuality in a halo that both veiled and revealed others. By organizing the sexual game on an institutional basis, by introducing into it a delicate dialectic of public and private, lawful and unlawful, Islam gave a positive meaning to sexuality, and therefore, ultimately, to oneself and to others. By depriving sexuality of its mystery I rob myself of my own meanings. Hence that joyless, savourless, colourless eroticism that is no more than bestiality.
Conversely, the Islamic faith, founded on the meaning of the dialogue with God and orientated towards the vision of God, was able to integrate the orgasm into the transcending self. The exercise of sexuality was a prayer, a gift of oneself, an act of charity. Preoccupied with defending a doctrine challenged on every side and increasingly at odds with life, Muslims gradually came to attach themselves to the external forms of sexual activity, rather than to the soul that ought to animate it. Hence that aberrant hostility to sex. Preoccupied with saying what has in any case been lost one has not tried sufficiently to understand and to think. Those anathemata and excommunications certainly express in their own way the same anxiety, the same fear that can be detected in so many apprentice Don Juans. It is not a paradox if religious conservatism and sexual pseudo-revolutionism express one and the same malaise. They are merely a flight from a world that has become enigmatic, difficult to understand, in which political, technological, economic, scientific and artistic success appears all too often as beyond our grasp. In a world in which frustration, aggression and anxiety have become everyday conditions, hyper-sexuality and religious puritanism are certainly convenient ways of escaping our responsibilities and masking our failures.
To emerge from this malaise we must at all costs rediscover the sense of sexuality, that is to say, the sense of the dialogue with the other partner, and the sense of the faith, that is to say, the sense of the dialogue with God. The authentic encounter with the other sex, the search for the secret life of the other enable me to rediscover the sense of my own existence. It has often been said that it is not sexuality that invents love, but love that reveals sexuality. It is not so much the flesh that is liberated as the spirit that is revealed through the flesh. For sexuality properly performed is tantamount to freedom assumed.
But this respect of the other is a revelation of meaning. The meaning of God cannot be revealed outside love. The transcending of self is also an act of faith. If the flesh involves charity it is because faith implies love. To rediscover the meaning of sexuality is to rediscover the meaning of God, and conversely. Hence the value that we attach to so many of the lessons provided by the Islamic tradition. The rereading that I have proposed in this book is intended to nourish a reflection orientated towards action and towards life. And, of course, we know very well, where faith is concerned, as also where love is concerned, everything is always to be reinvented and rediscovered. Man can find himself only in a tomorrow that is still largely unknown. No one is born by spontaneous generation and in cultural matters the legacy may be alienated, but the most authentic revolutions are always those that are able to rediscover the profound continuities of tomorrow with today and with yesterday.
Now the meaning of Islam cannot be dissociated from, that of sexuality. That is why I gave myself the double task of disengaging the context inherent in the perception of sexuality by Islam and in the concrete reality of sexuality within the Arabo-Muslim societies. This is because Islam is neither a philosophical system, nor a doctrine, nor a sect, nor even an ‘ideology’. It is, for us, a living, concrete reality. It is a vision of the absolute inscribed in the historical. Islam in general is a junction of the eternal and the historical. From the point of view that concerns us here it is a symbol of love and faith. It would be seriously misleading to see it simply as a technique to be used in the relations between God and man. Islam is a deepening awareness of self in order to unveil the divine majesty inseparable both from others and from oneself. For man is the only creature capable of apprehending the majesty of God and of giving a meaning to being-sexually-with-others. Throughout my work I was made aware that Islam posited unity of meaning: the meaning of God, the meaning of others, the meaning of man spring from the same intuition. That is why the message of Muhammad is not to be confined to a particular religious experience, or to a single experience of love. It is a message: the continuous renewal at all times of the vision of man concomitant with a vision of the world in which sexuality plays a leading role. But Islam aims to place the humanity above the animality within us. Hence the meaning given to sexuality that is constitutive of the humanity within us. If it is true, as Gaston Bachelard has said, that ‘man is half-open being’,29 it is because that opening is at one and the same time faith and love.
To pose the question of the meaning of sexuality is ultimately to pose the question of the meaning of creation – and therefore that of the meaning of God and that of the meaning of man. For man is the only being for whom such a question can have any meaning. Ultimately, everything in Islam revolves around the question of meaning, perceived both as an urge towards the erotic and as spiritual inspiration. This meaning, to be found in the lyrical vision of fife and the search for a transcending of self through marital affection, seems to be on the decline today. It is precisely that meaning that we must rediscover.
Notes
Note: All references to the Quran are to the Oxford University Press, 1983 edition.
Part I The Islamic view of sexuality
1 J. Berque, Les Arabes d’hier à demain, p. 14ff.
2 Quran, ‘Thunder’, XIII, 35, p. 244.
Chapter 1 The Quran and the question of sexuality
1 Quran, ‘The Greeks’, XXX, 16–26, pp. 411–17. The Quran expounds in many passages this conception of the duality of creation and becoming involving all creatures. Cf. ‘The Cow’, II, 187; ‘Women’, IV, 1; ‘The Battlements’, VII, 189; ‘Thunder’, XIII, 38; ‘The Bee’, XVI, 72; ‘Abraham’, XIV, 44–5; ‘The Believers’, XXIII, 13ff; ‘The Poets’, XXVI, 36; ‘The Companies’, XXXIX, 8ff; ‘The Scatterers’, LI, 49; ‘The Star’, LIII, 45ff; ‘Noah’,
LXXI, 12ff; ‘The Resurrection’, LXXV, 37; ‘The Tiding’, LXVIII, 20ff.
2 Cf. the commentaries of Razi, vol. VI, p. 545ff; commentaries of Qortobi, vol. XIV, p. 14ff.
3 Ibn Manḍhūr, Lisān al-Arab, vol. III, p. 115ff.
4 Ibid., p. 115ff; Quran, LI, 49.
5 Ibid., p. 115ff; Quran, XXVI, 36.
6 Quran, ‘Women’, IV, 1, p. 72. Cf., also ‘The Battlements’, VII, 186; ‘The Companies’, XXXIX, 8; ‘The Star’, LIII, 45ff; ‘Noah’, LXXI, 13–14; ‘The Tidings’, LXXVIII, 20–1; ‘The Resurrection’, LXXV, 37–8.
7 Quran, ‘The Cow’, II, 183–7, pp. 24–5.
8 Quran, ‘The Companies’, XXXIX, 8, p. 471.
9 Quran, ‘The Believers’, XXXIII, 12–17, p. 343.
10 Raghib, Safīnat, ed. Bulaq, Cairo, 1286h., p. 15ff.
11 Quran, ‘The Battlements’, VII, 189, p. 166.
12 Cf. Quran, ‘The Cow’, II, 28–39; ‘The Battlements’, VII, 18–30. Cf., also, al-Qortobi, vol. VII, p. 179.
13 Quran, ‘Women’, IV, pp. 77–8.
14 Quran, ‘The Cow’, II, 228, p. 32. Cf. Abu Ḥayān, II, 190.
15 Quran, ‘Light’, XXIV, 32, p. 356.
16 Quran, ‘The Forbidding’, LXVI, 1, p. 593.
17 Quran, ‘The Table’, V, 89, pp. 113–14.
Chapter 2 Sexual prohibitions in Islam
1 Quoted in al-Bahy al-Khūly, al-mar-atu baynal-l-bayt wal-mujtama‘, p. 34: ‘faslu mā bayna-phalāl wal ḥarām aldaffu wal-sawtu fil nikāḥi’.
2 Quran, ‘The Cow’, II, 164: ‘Women’, IV, 19, 29, 30; ‘The Table’, V, 7; ‘The Bee’, XVI, 92; ‘The Night Journey’, XVII, 34; ‘The Believers’, XXIII, 7; ‘Light’, XXIV, 3–11, 18, 23, 33, 34; ‘Salvation’, XXV, 68–70; ‘The Spider’, XXIX, 43; ‘Counsel’, XLII, 35; ‘The Woman Tested’, LX, 12; ‘The Stairways’, LXX, 31–2.
3 Cf. Quran, ‘Women’, IV, 22, 26–7.
4 Razi, III, p. 189.
5 Ibid.
6 Cf. Havelock Ellis, Studies in the Psychology of Sex, vol. 1, New York, Random House, 1936 ed., p. 189ff.
7 Illegitimate children must be accepted by the community. They are always presumed to be free and of the confession of the majority of members of the social group that takes them in.
8 Quoted by Ahmed El Banā, Aḥkām al-walad, p. 12.
9 Quran, ‘The Disputer’, LVIII, 2, p. 569.
10 Kaffāra: a pious action, taking the form of freeing a slave, fasting, alms giving, extra prayers, carried out in order to expiate some crime.
11 ‘Ḥattā tadhūqua uṣailatahu wa yadhūqua uṣailataha’, cf. Abu Ḥayān II, p. 200.
Chapter 3 The eternal and Islamic feminine
1 Emel Esin, La Mecque, ville bénie; Médine, ville radieuse, p. 97.
2 Quran, ‘The Battlements’, VII, 18ff.
3 Quran, ‘The Ant’, XXVII, 22–44.
4 Quran, ‘The House of Imran’, III; ‘Mary’, XIX. Cf. also ‘The Prophets’, XXI, 31; ‘The Believers’, XXIII, 52; ‘The Forbidding’, LXVI, 12.
5 Quran, ‘The Battlements’, VII, 81ff; ‘Hood’, XI, 83; ‘El-Ḥijr’, XV, 59; ‘The Ant’, XXVII, 58; ‘The Spider’, XXIX, 33; ‘The Rangers’, XXXVII, 135; ‘The Forbidding’, LXVI, 10.
6 Quran, ‘El-Ḥijr’, XV, 61.
7 Quran, ‘The Forbidding’, LXVI, 10.
8 Quran, ‘The Prophets’, XXI, 89ff., p. 330.
9 Quran, ‘The Story’, XXVIII, 8, p. 392; ‘The Forbidding’, LXVI.
10 Quran, ‘Joseph’, XXI, 23ff, p. 228.
11 Gaudefroy-Demombynes, Mahomet, p. 67. Cf. Bokhari, the chapter devoted to Khadija, vol. V, p. 41ff. Cf. also Bent al-Shāty, Nisā al-Nabi, Beirut, undated, ‘Khadija’, pp. 27–50.
12 Quran, ‘Joseph’, XII.
13 Genesis, 39.
14 Quran, ‘Joseph’, XII, 22–34, pp. 228–9.
15 Razi, vol. V, p. 119. Cf. also Abu Ḥayān, vol. V, pp. 293–301.
16 Quran, ‘Joseph’, XII, 24, p. 228.
17 Razi, vol. V, p. 120.
18 Razi, vol. V, p. 120.
19 Razi, vol. V, p. 124.
20 Quran, ‘Joseph’, XII, 28, p. 229.
21 Razi, vol. V, p. 127.
22 Razi, vol. V, p. 126.
23 Abu Nasr al-Hamadhāni, al-Sab’iyāt, included in the Kitab al majālis al sunniiya fil kalām ’an al arba‘īn al nawawiyya, by the sheikh Ahmad al-Fashni, Cairo, 1299h., pp. 123–7.
Chapter 4 The frontier of the sexes
1 Alūsi Zādeh, Ghāliyyat al-mawā‘īdh, vol. II, p. 6.
2 Ibid., p. 5. Cf. ‘Ainī, vol. X, p. 279.
3 Liwāṭ sodomy. Cf. Alūssi Zādeh, vol. II, p. 4. Cf. also al-Jassas, Akkām al-qurān, vol. III, p. 263; Razi, vol. VI, p. 245ff. Cf. also Quran, VII, 78ff; XI, 79–84; XXI, 74; XXII, 43; XXVI, 165–75; XXVII, 56–9; XXIV, 27–33.
4 Razi, vol. VI, p. 247, vol. III, p. 182; Alussi, vol. II, p. 5; Jassas, vol. III, p. 263.
5 Cf. Genesis, 19, 1–23.
6 Genesis, 19, 30–40.
7 Cf. Quran, ‘The Battlements’, VII, p. 143ff.
8 Dictionnaire de sexologie, p. 273.
9 Alūssi, Ghāliat al-mawā’idhi, vol. II, p. 7.
10 Bokhāri, vol. VII, pp. 158–78.
11 Ibid., p. 166.
12 Ibid., p. 170.
13 Ibid., p. 177.
14 Ibid., p. 177.
15 Ibid., p. 179.
16 ‘Ainī, vol. X, p. 228.
17 Ibid., p. 186. Cf. also ‘Ainī, vol. X, p. 306.
18 Bokhāri, vol. VII, p. 182.
19 Ibid., vol. VII, p. 183.
20 Cf. Souques, Mahomet et l’hygiène; Mahomet et les parfums; H. Zayat, Le port de la barbe en islam.
21 Bokhāri, vol. VII, p. 182.
22 After Nawādir al-ishrāq fi makārim al akḥlāq, quoted by H. Zayat, loc. cit., p. 735.
23 Shams al-dīn al-Ansāri, Kitāb al-syāsa fi‘ilm al firāsa, lithographed, Cairo edition, 1882, p. 29.
24 A. Mazahéri, La Vie quotidienne des musulmans au Moyen Age, p. 70.
25 The Thousand and One Nights, II, pp. 374–5.
26 I shall return later to the theme of depilation of the pubis as a prelude to the sexual act and as a factor in eroticism.
27 ‘Ainī, vol. II, p. 320.
28 Quran, ‘Light’, XXIV, 30–1, pp. 355–6. Cf. Razi’s commentary, vol. VI, p. 295ff. Cf. ‘Ainī, vol. IX, p. 100 and vol. X, p. 480.
29 Ibn Ḥazm, Le Collier du pigeon, trans. Bercher, p. 325.
30 J.-P. Sartre, L’Être et le néant, p. 327; Being and Nothingness, trans. Hazel. E. Barnes, London, Methuen, 1958, p. 268.
31 Ibid.
32 Razi, vol. VI, p. 296. Cf. also Alūssi, p. 13.
33 Zayla’i, vol. VI, p. 18: ‘yakūnu ablaghu fī taḥṣīli ma’nā allaqhdhāti’.
34 Ibid.
35 Razi, vol. VI, pp. 297–8.
36 Ibn Manḍhūr, Lisan al’Arab, vol. VI, p. 293ff.
37 Zayla’i, vol. VI, p. 17.
38 Ibid.
39 Ibid., p. 18.
40 Ibid.
41 Alūsi Zādeh, vol. II, p. 13.
42 Cf. Fatāwā Hindiyya, vol. V, p. 327.
43 Alūsi Zādeh, vol. II, 7.
44 Ibid.
45 Quoted by Ibn Ḥazm, Le Collier du pigeon, p. 323.
46 Fatāwā Hindiyya, vol. V, 351.
47 Ibn Ḥazm, Le Collier du pigeon, p. 323.
48 Bokhāri, vol. VII, pp. 52 and 58. Cf. ‘Ainī, vol. X, p. 279ff. Moslem, vol. V, p. 444ff.
49 Ḥabīb Zayyat, La Femme garçonne en islam, p. 156.
50 Al-Washtāni, commentary by Moslem, vol. V, p. 444ff.
51 Moslem, vol. V, p. 445ff.
52 Ibrāhīm Ḥalbi, Multaqa al-abḥur, pp. 224–5.
53 For their prayer, said in the company of a woman, may be regarded as null and void. It is more prudent for them to begin it again.
54 It is his prayer that runs the risk of being null and void, if he later proves to be of the male sex.
56 As would be done in the case of a woman – just in case.
57 That is to say the same order as during his lifetime in the mosque.
Chapter 5 Purity lost, purity regained
1 For all these analyses I have followed a number of authors chosen by way of example from an inexhaustible literature: Bokhāri, Ṣaḥīḥ, vol. I, pp. 40–85; Zayla’i, Sharḥ Kanz al daqā-iq, vol. I, p. 2ff and p. 328ff; Ḥalbi, Multaqa al-Abḥur, p. 3ff; Safti-Hāshia, ‘Ala sharḥ Ibn Turki, pp. 26–112; Al-Fatāu’ā al-Hindiyya, vol. I, pp. 3–50 and 202–8; but above all, for its clarity and depth, Ghazali, Iḥyā ‘ulūm al-dīn, vol. I, pp. 117–34.
2 Cf. G. Bataille, L’Érotisme, p. 64; Eroticism, trans. Mary Dalwood, London, John Calder, 1962, pp. 45–6.
3 Ibn Manḍhūr Lisan al-Arab, vol. I, p. 189ff.
4 Ibid., vol. XIV, p. 6ff.
5 Ibid., vol. XX, p. 176. Cf. Qāmus al muḥīṭ, vol. IV, p. 385.
6 Ibid., vol. I, p. 25.
7 Ibid., vol. 14, p. 288.
8 Al-Fatāwā al-Hindiyya, vol. I, p. 47.
9 Ibid., vol. I, pp. 47-8.
10 Ghazali, op. cit., vol. I, p. 22: ‘allamanā rasūlu Ilāhi kulla shay-in ḥatta lkharā-ata’.
11 The fiqh distinguishes systematically between:
– the male mani: ‘The seminal fluid, which is thick, viscous, white. Its smell is like that of the spathe of a palm tree. When it flows the penis grows soft.’ In other words, sperm;
– female mani: ‘A fine, yellowish, seminal fluid, of strong smell.’ This is the vaginal fluid;
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