What the Qur’an brought was not full equality between the sexes, but, when considered in context, it was a great improvement. “In such a primitive world, what Muhammad achieved for women was extraordinary,” says British historian Karen Armstrong. “The very idea that a woman could be a witness or could inherit anything at all in her own right was astonishing.” That’s why the rights of women in Islamic law—the Shariah—would remain ahead of the West well into modern times. In the Middle Ages, some Christian scholars even criticized Islam for giving too much power to menials such as slaves and women. Even when Great Britain applied its legal system to Muslims in place of the Shariah, as it did in some of its colonies, married women were stripped of the property that Islamic law had always granted them.
Yet still, the concept of “rights” would not become a major theme in Islamic law. Mohammad Kamali, professor of Islamic law, points to this problem and notes that while the Qur’an introduced many individual rights—such as rights to life, property, privacy, movement, justice, personal dignity, and equality before the law—classical Islamic literature focused on duties.
In other words, an Islamic theory of rights could have been developed, for it had a basis in the Qur’an, but just as with Christianity, Muslims had to wait until modern times to look at their scripture with a more individualistic perspective. That’s why some new books of Islamic jurisprudence have chapters on “the rights and freedoms of the individual,” something the classical works lacked.
Yet still, the concept of “rights” would not become a major theme in Islamic law. Mohammad Kamali, professor of Islamic law, points to this problem and notes that while the Qur’an introduced many individual rights—such as rights to life, property, privacy, movement, justice, personal dignity, and equality before the law—classical Islamic literature focused on duties.
In other words, an Islamic theory of rights could have been developed, for it had a basis in the Qur’an, but just as with Christianity, Muslims had to wait until modern times to look at their scripture with a more individualistic perspective. That’s why some new books of Islamic jurisprudence have chapters on “the rights and freedoms of the individual,” something the classical works lacked.
