An Anthology of Qur'anic Commentaries, Volume II: On Women

by Karen Bauer (Editor), Feras Hamza (Editor)

Building on from An Anthology of Qur'anic Commentaries, Volume I: On the Nature of the Divine, this second volume focuses on a critical and contentious theme: women in the Qur'an and Qur'anic interpretation. Comprising analysis and translations of the Qur'an, traditional Qur'anic commentaries, and interviews of scholars, this work probes the impact of the medieval interpretive tradition on modern Muslim women's rights, social status, intellectual authority, and spiritual standing within their communities. It also provides a counter to that historical interpretive monopoly by engaging contemporary Muslim voices. An Anthology of Qur'anic Commentaries, Volume II: On Women begins with a ground-breaking discursive analysis of all the Qur'an's verses on women and the female subject. This prolegomenon follows the Qur'anic narrations on women in a chronological sequence, showing how the Qur'an's worldview developed from the earliest Meccan revelations--when women were addressed only implicitly as a part of households or in the course of anti-pagan polemic--through the Later Meccan period--when prominent women appeared as exemplary figures--to the period of the final revelations in Medina--when women were addressed directly as pious and social subjects. The remainder of the volume translates, critically annotates, and analyses interpretations of six select Qur'anic verses on women. These verses, chosen because of their relevance to women's lived experience, speak of the creation of humankind from the first couple, beginning with a single soul (Q. 4:1); the exemplary figure of Mary, the mother of Jesus (Q. 3:35-6); women's status in marriage (Q. 4:34); women's legal testimony and hence legal capacity (Q. 2:282); and 'veiling' as it relates to Qur'anic norms of modesty (Q. 24:31). The interpretations include commentaries composed between the eighth and the twentieth centuries and interviews with leading Muslim scholars of the Qur'an, both traditionalist and reformist. While highlighting variation, continuity, and plurality in the genre of Qur'anic commentaries, Volume II goes beyond medieval interpretive paradigms to include perspectives marginalised by that tradition, such as the voices of women themselves.

Genres: Islam

752 pages, Hardcover

Published January 25, 2022

About the author

Dr. Karen Bauer (PhD, Princeton) is a Senior Research Associate in the Qur’anic Studies Unit of the Institute of Ismaili Studies, London. She specialises in Islamic social and intellectual history; her specific interests include the Qur’an and Qur’anic exegesis, the history of emotions in early Islam, and gender in Islamic history and thought.