The Saudi clerical establishment is once more making noise that Islam is only for them; not for women, and eventually not for any other men. Their latest proposal is that women should be barred from taking part in one of the commandments of the faith, to make pilgrimage to Mecca. Although women can still go to the city, they are to be kept separate from the Ka’ba, the actual point of the pilgrimage. The argument is that women and men should not mix, and it is too crowded to keep them separate. Perhaps we should look at basic infrastructure, or alternate years between men and women. However, the real goal has never been to advance the religion.
Like sheep they bleat a refrain that seeks to exclude people, instead of understanding their faith. During the lifetime of the Prophet Muhammad, there was no objection to men and women mixing during the pilgrimage. It was this argument that repelled this group of “scholars” the last time they tried to make this proposition. These so-called learned men are constantly taking the religion taught by Muhammad and turning it around to suit their political goals and aims. I have argued on the pages of RD that the Saudi religious class purposefully manipulates the understanding of Islam in order to ensure their own supremacy.
This particular instance relates to women and continuing to make them less than human, less than Muslim. If these buffoons can treat half of the members of the faith this way, it is not too difficult to imagine them going after other groups of Muslims. This week women. Next week Shi’ah. The week after, non-Arabs. Eventually, it will be a death match scenario, a literal cockfight as two bearded men circle each other, each one claiming to be the only “true” Muslim. I would gladly contribute to the cost of the octagon now if you would it just get these clerics, who claim there are no clerics in Islam, to shut up and leave the Muslim community alone.
