Gender Dynamics in Mystical Islam.

The Divine Rahma.

In Sufi symbolism, as well as in Islam itself, human beings are surrounded by the feminine in their own existence. It is through the Divine Rahma or Mercy and Compassion that the world is made manifest, through the Nafs-i-Rahman or the Breath of the Compassionate out of which all things came into being. And the Quran tells us that God’s Mercy encompasses all things.

 

The Arabic word Rahma is grammatically feminine, and is etymologically related to the root word Raham, meaning womb. Just as the womb nurtures and sustains every human being, the Divine Womb of God’s Compassion and Mercy nourishes, protects and sustains everything in existence. The womb is also a specifically feminine concept.
Man’s relationship to the Divine in this way is like the relationship of the mother to the child.

Man/Human being situated in between the dual poles of Femininity.

On the one hand, man or Insan is surrounded by the feminine element of Divine Mercy and from another perspective, he is also situated between two poles of femininity.

For all men potentially, and for the Sufi mystic in particular, life is a constant struggle to overcome the nafs, soul or passionate self, and to draw closer to the Divine by striving for the knowledge of the Divine Dhat. Both the nafs , which must be dominated on the path to spiritual realisation , and the Dhat towards which man must strive to draw closer, are grammatically feminine in the Arabic language.

The Sufi conquering the nafs [nafs al ammara bil su – the soul that commands to evil] is often portrayed as man subduing the feminine within himself, usually understood to mean his spiritual weakness.

In the Quran we find a reference to gender relationship in marriage in the verse which says: men are in charge of women and the best women are the ones who are submitting. In traditional interpretations when the roles are reversed, chaos ensues.
The mystical interpretation of this verse would convey that a proper spiritual life or a life lived in the state of Divine Union requires that the spirit or intellect, ruh or aql, which are grammatically masculine terms, rule over the passionate soul which is grammatically feminine. In other words the true man or the spiritually aware human being is “in charge of women” or in control of his/her nafs.

At the same time, turning to the other end of the pole, we see that the Hidden Essence of God or Dhat is also symbolically feminine. If the nafs kindles the base desires in man, the Dhat is the source of his highest aspirations and the most ennobling desire.

In the first relationship, the Sufi strives to conquer the nafs, and in the second relationship, the Sufi surrenders himself to the desire for the Dhat.

Man’s authority over women is thus seen as the symbol of the domination of the intellect over passions, and man’s desire for women on an emotional and physical level is the yearning of the soul for the Spiritual Beloved that is Dhat.

In the case of a female mystic one could understand that the verse which says, “the best women are the ones that submit”, means the ego’s obedience to the intellect or the Spirit.

Fariduddin Attar wrote with reference to Rabia Al Adawiyya, “When a woman becomes a man on the path of God, she is a man and one cannot anymore call her a woman.”

Rumi says, “An effeminate man is not suited to fight against the ego;
 Incense and musk are not suited for the back parts of a donkey.
Since women never go out to fight the holy war, how should they engage in the greater holy war?
Except rarely, when a Rustam is hidden in a female’s body, as in the case of Mary.
In the same way, women are hidden in the bodies of those men who are feminine from faintness of heart.

The Insan-I-Kamil a Non-Gender Specific Reality.

 

The prototype of the Insan-I-Kamil is not the masculine Adam as opposed to the feminine Eve. It is, in fact, the as-yet-undiferentiated  Adam, the “single soul” of the Quran from which all men and women were created. This primordial Adam or the undifferentiated single soul was made in the “image of God” and so reflected the Divine perfection.

As God contains both masculine and feminine qualities, possessing both names of majesty, such as judge, king, lord, strong, and names of beauty, such as merciful, compassionate, gentle, friend, loving, so too did the primordial Adam contain both the feminine and the masculine virtues and qualities.

Thus it would be reasonable to infer that if one is hopeful of attaining to the original Adamic state of purity or the perfection of the Insan-I-Kamil, one must attain a balance of both the masculine and feminine qualities. It is not enough for a man to be brave, strong and detached, but he must also be inwardly kind, nurturing, gentle and devoted. Likewise a woman may have to acquire certain masculine virtues such as bravery and detachment.
Viewed from this perspective, if every woman on the Path is a man, then every man on the Path must also be a woman in the sense of acquiring positive feminine traits.

The Relativity of Virtue.

 

The feminine virtues of devotion, compassion, mercy and nurturing are positive in themselves, but negative in their tendency to attach one to worldly things. For the female Sufi it would be important to purify these qualities and to direct them inwardly countering them with a healthy detachment.

Similarly, the masculine virtues of strength and bravery could become corrupted and thus the source of spiritual ailment. In particular, masculine dominance, when not set within proper limits, has the tendency to develop into masculine vices such as pride and a hunger for domination and conquest. This would then be termed as negative masculinity.

Satan’s moral error is the prototype of a particularly masculine vice, for it involves a perverted use of reason in the service of self-pride and a reluctance to submit to another.

The Message for Humanity Today.

 

We have heard of the days when human society was governed on the basis of physical strength and prowess and therefore male control and dominance was important. We have seen the suppressed femininity expressing itself in the movement for women’s rights and liberation, but the secular women’s liberation movement has also failed the point and has instead tried to prove that women are equal to men…similar to men.

The Path of Wisdom, however, does not claim the superiority of the male or the superiority of the female, but in fact , shows the perfection of the human state as a balance of the female and the masculine elements. This is the Reality of the Divine as well which is a composite whole of Jalal and Jamal characteristics. Creation is nothing but an elaborate display of the Asma and Sifaat of Allah for the sake of bringing Him from the realm of the Unknown into the realm of the Known.

We have long entered the Age of Unity, since the revelation of the Deen of Unity, Islam, but little have we understood its implications and significance so as to transform humanity into the desired Divine vehicle that it is meant to be.

Understanding “Gender-Reality” is at the root of making this fundamental shift in our personal as well as universal perspective.

 

Inshallah, this discourse will open up new ways in which we see ourselves and our relationships.

 

Reference: “Walking Upon the Path of God Like Men”, essay by Maria Massi Dakake.