Na'eem Jeenah

In many Muslim communities in South Africa, and for many Muslim women in South Africa, Ramadan and ‘id al-Fitr – as much as both are occasions of great joy – are characterised by a certain anxiety.

Will they, many Muslim women ask themselves at this time, be able to pray their taraweeh and ‘Id prayers this year in jamaah. Or will they be prevented from entering the mosque. And if their mosque has ‘facilities for women’ (that very famous phrase in Muslim discourse), will the facilities be as decent as the men’s. Or will it be a stinky basement or a gallery from where the imam cannot be seen. Will they be able to enjoy their tarawih and ‘Id prayers as the men do. Should they go to the ‘Id prayer, seeing as they have to prepare the ‘Id meal and have it ready for the men when they return from salah.

The role, place, position of women in mosques varies from place to place. Even in one city in South Africa one could find different arguments on this issue and different mosques applying different standards.

When foreign Muslims visit here, they are usually stunned that there are so many masajid in South Africa which have absolutely no facilities for women. And this includes visitors from some of the more conservative Muslim countries. That there are some mosques (many in the Western Cape, fewer in other provinces) which do have facilities for women does not placate them. And when they go to some of the masajid with women’s facilities, they become even more despondent to see torn carpets in tiny rooms, narrow rooms, dirty rooms, damp rooms, dark rooms that pass off as ‘women’s sections’.

In most of the world, even in most countries where honour killings are rife, where women are prevented from working and women are discriminated against in applications of family law, it is taken for granted that women will be able to go to the neighbourhood mosque to pray.

The configurations of the space for women in mosques varies. A number of mosques around the world have decided to do away with the women’s gallery or women’s basement and to include women in the main space of the masjid where they have direct access to the khutbah and the imam’s leading of the salah. In some, women are at the back, in others they stand on one side while men stand on the other. Sometimes this main space is divided by a partition or a curtain or a chain or just a strip of carpet.

Apart from the most famous such masjid – the Haram in Makkah where women and men have always prayed in the same space, the Islamic Centre of Southern California and the Noor Cultural Centre in Toronto also come to mind. And, locally, there is the Claremont Main Road Masjid in Cape Town where, since 1994, women and men have been praying in the main space, separated by a plastic chain.

Johannesburg’s Masjidul Islam has had women and men standing side-by-side – separated by a strip of carpet – for its outdoors ‘Id salah for the past eight years. And the masjid has now decided to divide the main space in the masjid so that women can be accommodated there and will not have to go to the upstairs gallery section. (I’m sure all the women who have, over the years, complained bitterly about the erratic sound system will be relieved.)

Interestingly, almost at every Masjidul Islam ‘Id salah, someone will suggest to the masjid committee that women should stand at the back. The committee has stubbornly maintained its position.

In Durban, the North Beach ‘Id salah also has women and men in the same space and has become extremely popular over the past three years since it began.

Of course, the masjid of the Prophet Muhammad (s) had women and men praying in the same space. There were no partitions, no curtains, no chains or strings. Just women and men praying together in a small space. And the masjid was the centre of activity for the community, including for women. There was even an incident of a woman refugee camping in the masjid for many days.

It’s amazing that with that prophetic example, Muslims can still say things like ‘There is no jumu’ah salah for women’, a statement I have heard many times. (I heard a variation of that last year when a large group of people gathered at Johannesburg’s Zoo Lake to perform Salah al-janazah for Hamas leader Abdul Aziz Rantisi. ‘There is no janazah salah for women,’ I was told by one young man. I can’t imagine how anyone can boldly make statements that so blatantly contradict the sunnah of the Prophet (s).

As far as the ‘Id salah is concerned, the Prophet (s), as recorded in a number of aḥādīth, encouraged and even instructed women to be present at the place where the salah would take place. He even instructed menstruating women to attend (but not pray). Strange that there are so few venues in South Africa where women are able to participate in the ‘Id salah.

But, despite they way in which Muslim women are marginalised in our mosques, this does not mean they play no role in our masajid. One of my childhood memories is of the local masjid committee members regularly visiting my widowed grandmother to raise funds for the building of a masjid. Some of the first masjids in this country, in the Cape Colony, were built by women.

But such involvement does not necessarily translate into the power to control what happens in the masajid or, even, to secure a space in it for the women who built them. A beautiful masjid in a small Kwazulu Natal town was built about 15 years ago by a women’s group. They raised the money for it, decided on how it will look and it is named after the organisation. But, after it was built, the masjid was handed over to the men to run. The result: yet another masjid where women are marginalised.

The men in some masajid go to great lengths to prevent women from attending the salah – even when there is space set aside for them. I know of one mosque where the maulana tried his utmost to subvert the committee’s decision to have women praying in the masjid. Deliberate delays with putting in a sound system, insisting on a completely separate entrance for women, then insisting on separate driveways for women and men, all in an attempt to delay the inevitable.

In all the battles – and there have been many – that have taken place in this country around the issue of women’s space in the masjid, one lesson is clear. There will be no space for women in our masajid unless women themselves fight for it. And once the space is won, it will mean nothing if the women don’t use it. Taraweeh salah this Ramadan and the upcoming ‘Id salah are good places to start.

September 2005
published in Al-Qalam

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Last updated: 07 September 2007