thesis
'She Who Disputes': A Qur'anic Precedent for Sacral Interlocution
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Abstract
Despite enduring differences between the Abrahamic traditions Islam, Christianity
and Judaism, women of these faiths have a shared experience of exclusion from
institutional theological enterprises, where women are depicted as silent subjects of
faith. This thesis considers women as speaking subjects in the Qur'an within a literary
reading to explore an Abrahamic interfeminist dialogue. The thesis compares how
women's subjectivity has been interpreted historically in traditional Islamic
scholarship with modem feminist deconstruction of androcentric language, in order to
consider how women are presented as addressees of the text. Female speaking roles
are explored through the language of dispute (jadala) as a thematic feature of the
Qur'an, with the surah-title al-mujadilah, 'she who disputes', as pivotal character.
The thesis draws on recent literary scholarship that has called for a canonical
understanding of the text, whereby the Qur'an is viewed as a literary unit wherein
formal structure is seen to have religious significance. The Qur'anic terms of gender
and debate are read as part of an internal Qur'anic semiology that develops from the
earlier to the later Qur'anic chapters through the expression of Qur'anic Sign. The
chronological consideration of the Qur' an's terms of debate presented a model that
critiques women's exclusion from the theological process as revealed knowledge
while affirming their inclusion in the revelatory scheme not only for the Muslim
addressee of Scripture, but for her Jewish and Christian counterparts as well. The
thesis thus presents a novel approach of reading biblical texts in light of a Qur'anic
model as an Abrahamic theology of women who speak