This research-based book clears the misconception that honour-related
violence against women occurs only in Asian and African Muslim countries. It
attempts to explain the origin and persistence of the honour code through the
study of histories of religious, legal, social and political institutions, from
ancient times to the present day
Dr Tahira S. Khan writes about the role of legal codes
developed in ancient and modern times regulating the moral life of
people
Going back into the history of legal institutions we find that
penal codes and religious sanctions were particularly developed to regulate the
sexual and moral life of communities. They present a clear picture of unequal
punishments for men and women for committing moral/sexual crimes such as
adultery, fornication, rape, etc. Modern liberal feminist researchers propose
that these legal inequalities were a major cause of women’s historical
oppression and subservience. While agreeing with this proposition partially, I
take the Marxist materialist approach and raise a question: do legal
inequalities precede economic inequalities or do economic inequalities give
birth to uneven and unjust legal codes? A critique of legal decrees, practices,
penal codes, and ethical/philosophical writings also depict social conditions,
moral values and societal attitudes towards women’s “im/proper” sexual conduct
...
Overall, legal and moral codes had been misogynistic, pro-male,
repressive regarding female sexuality, and lenient regarding male sexual
practices.
Most of the writings mention the rights of sons but not
daughters. Hardly anywhere have daughters been mentioned regarding property
rights (the Egyptian civilisation is an exception). One can easily trace the
roots of the “son preference” phenomenon in ancient times, which is present even
today in many Asian and African societies. Sons, in addition to material
property and wealth, were very precious assets.
Regarding the
misogynistic clauses and gender-based legal inequalities present in the ancient
penal codes, we start with the Code of Hammurabi. Showing the importance and
value of sons, the Code of Hammurabi mentions “If any one steals the minor son
of another, he shall be put to death.” There is no mention of daughters being
stolen. It can be interpreted in two ways: sons were the precious holding of
each family and they were being stolen, but daughters, due to their non-value,
were never stolen. Or, if they were, it was not thought important to punish the
culprit.
Marriage patterns are easy to understand by examining the Code
of Hammurabi. Fathers and brothers had authority to arrange girls’ marriages.
The institution of dowry existed, in which some valuables were given to the
woman to be taken to the husband’s house. In addition, in most cases, the
husband had to pay a bride price. Both institutions (dowry and bride price)
existed simultaneously. There was no concept of romantic love as a factor for
marriage. Primarily, calculations of economic and social status were made during
marriage arrangements.
Punishments for female sexual misconduct were
exceptionally harsher than those for males. The act of adultery by a woman was a
capital crime. “If a man’s wife be surprised (in flagrante delicto) with another
man, both shall be tied and thrown into the water, but the husband may pardon
his wife and the king his slaves.” Here it is important to note the mode of
punishment for adulterous people. Further, the Code says: “If a man brings a
charge against one’s wife, but she is not surprised with another man, she must
take an oath and then may return to her house.”
The Code further deals
with the false accusation of adultery against a woman. “If the ‘finger is
pointed’ at a man’s wife about another man, but she is not caught sleeping with
the other man, she shall jump into the river for her husband [to prove her
innocence].”
Punishment is prescribed only in the event of a wife’s act
of adultery, not for adultery committed by a husband. Further, lax sexual
relationships are crimes mostly when a woman is married; for female slaves or
concubines, there is no restriction or punishment under the clauses of adultery.
There is not much mention of fornication by unmarried young girls or single
women.
Strict monogamy was observed for women and polygamy was
exclusively allowed to men. Rape was recognised as a crime and the penalty for
such an act was capital punishment …
Rape was a bigger crime when the
issue of virginity was at stake. Besides the punishments for adultery, women
were subject to harsher treatment by their husbands regarding their marital
duties. In other words, domestic violence was sanctioned. Men were allowed to
discipline and tame their women. “If she is not innocent but leaves her husband,
and ruins her house, neglecting her husband, this woman shall be cast into the
water.”
Due to an economic system that was based on the ownership of
private property, the issue of inheritance and paternity was at the centre of
the penal code regarding regulating female sexuality and morals
...
Practices such as divorce or remarriage of widows were legal and
accepted socially. However, we do not find acceptance of such practices in the
ancient Hindu religion in South Asia. Hindu religious penal codes have been
notable for their opposition to the re-marriage of widows and the harsh
treatment of widows even today.
A few centuries later (1650-1500BC),
another legal code, the Code of the Nesilim, was developed by the Hittites.
Again we find a set of laws emphasising status and class-consciousness, in which
female sexuality was very much controlled and watched, compared to male sexual
freedom. Romantic love was not a factor for a male and female to marry.
Determination of paternity was at the centre of the family institution. Harsh
restrictions were imposed on sexual interaction between the free/mistress
(female owners of slaves) women and slave or freed men. On the contrary, the
relationship between a free man and female slave was not forbidden as long as
the man had control of the children …
About four centuries later, we find
the Code of the Assura (circa 1075BCE) in which there are penalties and
regulations regarding the control of female sexuality, marriage, and paternity.
The issue of marriage is settled through the male members of the family and
there is no place for marriage based on romantic love. There is a clear
difference between the punishment for rape and the punishment given to an
adulterous woman. In the case of rape, there is capital punishment for the
rapist of a married woman but there is no punishment at all for the rapist of an
unmarried woman or female slave. It looks as if a free woman as a wife had
higher status in Assyrian society than an unmarried or enslaved woman. How do we
interpret such distinction? The married woman’s womb was actually the property
of her husband, and the husband as well as the legal system, wanted to determine
the paternity of the child born in that marriage so the child could be
considered the legitimate heir of the father's property, class, prestige, and
rank in society ...
Records of ancient societies prove they were very
class and status conscious and social stratification was created and guarded
through religious decrees and legal codes. Dress codes and veiling/head scarves
were used to make distinction between the elite women and “loose or slave
women”.
The purpose of such dress codes was to keep unrelated men away
from the women of the elite and to curtail their social mobility by making them
distinctive through different dresses …
We see how society was divided on the basis of gender, but gender
was further divided by the socio-economic class of women. Women and men were
divided, and women were further divided on the basis of their dress, their
outlook, and their appearance.
The construction of the honour/shame
schema relating to female sexuality was already in the offing about four
millennia ago. Devices for the control and discipline of female sexuality and
body for the assurance of the exact paternity of the children for materialistic
motives were already introduced long ago, starting in the time of Hammurabi and
present in various forms in many subsequent civilisations ...
A survey of
the conditions of women in the ancient civilisation of Egypt provides some
distinct features and differences that women faced in Egypt compared with other
contemporary or predecessor civilisations. Socio-economically, Egyptian society
was divided into sharp classes and different ranks, but there were fewer gender
divisions among the classes.
It appears that “Egyptian women seem to have
the same legal and economic rights as Egyptian men — at least in theory.
Egyptian women had property rights, unlike women of the civilisations ... There
was no social stigma for out-of-wedlock children. There is do mention of veils
or headscarves anywhere in the legal codes. Physical mobility was not
restricted. In contrast to the civilisations discussed previously, Egyptian
society seems more tolerant, and less gender biased. But we must not forget the
discriminatory status of women in different classes. We cannot expect the same
liberties and equal status for women in the lower classes, or enslaved women. If
not gender, then class was the major factor of women’s oppression.
Let us
proceed towards another grand era of human history — Ancient Rome, which, in
fact, made a deep impact on the lives and status of women during the early
centuries after Christ. Socio-ethical boundaries regarding female and male
interaction had been constructed and restrictions on female sexual behaviour had
already been imposed in previous or contemporary civilisations.
Now,
however, more strict and novel devices were invented to strengthen the control
on women.
Stricter dress codes and observation of veiling were compulsory
for free and elite women. The distinction between the appearances and attitudes
of free and elite women and female slaves or freed lower-class women was
maintained purposely. The husband’s harshness in marital life was increased and
encouraged gradually. The major source of information on female sexuality and
penal codes here is the information available on the internet.
In the
first century AD, economic extravagance and adultery were widespread in Rome.
Emperor Augustus introduced stricter laws regarding sexual morality and
introduced provisions establishing adultery as a crime ...
Not only were
fathers and husbands given legal permission to kill their daughters and wives in
case they committed adultery; brothers (who had paternal powers) were also
allowed to take action against their sisters. “If a son under paternal power,
who is the father, should surprise his daughter in the act of adultery, while it
is inferred from the words of the law that he cannot kill her, still, he ought
to be permitted to do so.”
In Roman law we find historical clues to the
development of the honour/passion code as a mitigating factor for the lighter
punishment for the murderer of a wife or daughter in today’s world. Present day
legal codes and judiciary recognise the factor of honour and passion as a
genuine excuse to reduce the punishment for the male perpetrator. Roman law
says, “It has been decided that a husband who kills his wife when caught with an
adulterer should be punished more leniently, for the reason that he committed
the act through impatience caused by just suffering.” …
The rules for
veiling and the dress code were accompanied by the expectation of obedience to
the husband as well as avoiding social interaction with unequal males and
females in society ... Besides the imposition of greater restrictions on female
sexuality, women’s social interaction was also being regulated and disciplined.
The mode of punishment for female deviance or disobedience was also going
through a change. In the Hammurabi and Assyrian codes, capital punishment was a
normal practice. Now, the “tool of divorce” was being used more frequently
against the disobedient woman. A woman’s disobedience was not only related to
her sexual acts. Her social activity, without the prior permission of her
husband, was also considered an act of disobedience that could be punished by
divorce …
The above mentioned punishments for disobedient wives were in
addition to capital punishment for the act of adultery, which had existed
centuries before the Roman laws. The right of a husband to kill his wife caught
committing adultery had already been recognised by the second century AD
...
It was actually a male conspiracy to maintain the upper hand on
women, whether they were daughters or wives. Fathers made sure that the husbands
of their daughters had the upper hand on their wives and would not allow the
power hierarchy to be disturbed. There are, thus, very visible commonalities
between the perceptions of women of the later Roman period and those of early
Christian philosophers, as well as between the Muslim historians and
philosophers’ writings during the early and later Islamic period.
A
woman’s obedience to her parents and husband, virginity and chastity, veiling,
and tolerance of a husband’s physical violence have all been matters of concern
for the male religious clergy of all three major patriarchal religions and their
legal codes. Women, whether living in ancient or contemporary times, or in East
or West, have been socialised to internalise and follow these basic
male-dictated tenets.
A philosopher of Greek origin, Plutarch lived in
Rome during the first century AD. Besides recording the general perception
prevailing in Roman society toward women in general, Plutarch himself preached
his beliefs about the need for women’s obedience, the importance of veiling, and
the virtues of virginity and chastity. Plutarch accepted the subordinate status
of women. His ultimate message was that the “woman is still like a child. A
wife’s husband is both her father and her mother.” In Plutarch’s writings we
find early traces of the concept of a dress code for women …
By the seventh century, with the advent of Islam as another major
monotheistic religion, we see the narrowing of the free-slave divide to the
point that there were almost no restrictions on marriages between slaves and
free men and women.
The biggest marital restriction for Muslim women was
that they could not marry non-Muslim men, until they converted to Islam. A man’s
status as slave or free and his ethnic or tribal affiliation did not matter. But
for Muslim men even the restriction of religious faith was removed and Muslim
men could marry Jewish or Christian women without them converting to
Islam.
The same marriage rules of restricted choices for Muslim women and
broader choices for Muslim men to marry non/Muslim persons chalked down in the
early days of Islam still apply to males and females in present Muslim
societies. Besides, in both great religions, Islam and Christianity, there was
not any concept of romantic love as a primary or necessary motive for marital
union in the early centuries, nor has there been any endorsement by religious
authorities of romantic love for today’s generation. An interesting point here
is that even 14 centuries ago Islam never condemned or rejected romantic love as
a force between a couple in the decision to be married. But one can observe a
striking difference in actual marital laws and practices: among Christian
communities (especially in the West), romantic love has been recognised as the
only legitimate motive for a couple to marry, while on the contrary, such a
development has not occurred in today’s Muslim societies, whether living in the
East or the West.
Muslim elders are strongly hostile to the idea of
marriage based on romantic love or affection between two youngsters. Why did the
two religious communities take divergent paths regarding the matrimonial
decisions of their younger generations? What kind of impact has it made on male
and female dynamics in Muslim communities? And our mega question: Does romantic
love have anything to do with honour crimes, especially against girls and
unmarried adolescent women? …
The nature of discriminatory laws and
misogynistic religious attitudes toward female sexuality and women’s status in
the family and society was not a totally new phenomenon introduced by Islam. In
one way or another, every practice and law related to women in Islam had been
present in previous civilisations and religions in various forms. In today’s
world, Islam is notorious for its endorsement and acceptance of laws regarding
polygamy, repudiation (man’s exclusive right to divorce his wife on the spot),
physical segregation, dress code (veiling), rejection of out-of-wedlock
children, stigma about premarital sex, emphasis on virginity, submission of
wives and daughters to family men, and, adultery ... All such discriminatory
laws and restrictions on female sexuality existed before Islam, most of the time
in a more derogatory way.
Excerpted with permission from
Beyond Honour: A Historical Materialist Explanation of Honour Related Violence
By Dr Tahira S. Khan
Oxford University Press, Plot # 38, Sector 15, Korangi
Industrial Area, Karachi
Tel: 111-693-673.
Email: ouppak@theoffice.net
Website: www.oup.com.pk
ISBN 0-19-597902-8
361pp. Rs495