WUNRN
Via Women Living Under Muslim Laws
WLUML - http://www.wluml.org/node/6537
by LOUISA LIM
- July 21, 2010
It is 5:50 in the morning, and
dark shadows scurry through narrow alleys to the mosque, as the call to prayer
echoes from a minaret in
As she leads the service,
"The status is the
same,"
Ariana Lindquist
for NPR
Yao Baoxia is a female ahong, or imam, at
Wangjia Hutong Women's Mosque in
Her main role is as a teacher, she
says.
"When people come to pray,
they don't know how to chant the Quran, so my job is teaching people about
Islam, helping them to study one line at a time and leading the prayers,"
she says.
Mosques Began As
Quranic Schools
The modest courtyard of Wangjia
Hutong Women's Mosque contains within it the entire history of
Like other women's mosques, it
began as a Quranic school for girls. These sprang up in the late 17th century
in central
Remembering
her own childhood, 83-year-old Tang Guiying says even then the women's mosque
was the only place a girl could receive education.
Women at the Wangjia mosque work
early in the morning in the kitchen. The mosques began as Quranic schools for
girls in the late 17th century. They were the only places girls could receive
an education; now, they also serve as community centers.
"I didn't go to school when I
was small," she chuckles. "We were all too poor; none of us girls
studied. But I came here to play and study. The old imam was very, very old —
she was 80-something, and she had bound feet."
Tang is sitting in the mosque's
washroom as she talks. This is where women conduct ritual ablutions before
prayer. This space — and the mosque itself — doubles as a social center for
these women, the heart of a community.
In
A Unique Chinese
Tradition
Shui Jingjun, of the Henan Academy
of Social Sciences and co-author of a book on the phenomenon, says that so far
there are no women's mosques in other countries. In most of the Muslim world,
women pray behind a partition or in a separate room, but in the same mosque as
men.
Shui points out that the women's
mosques in
"After reform and opening up
[in 1979], some female mosques registered independently, which shows the
equality of male and female mosques," she explains.
Controversy still rages in the
Muslim world about whether women can be imams. In 2006,
Credit: Adrienne Wollman/NPR
They can't, for instance, lead
funeral rituals or wash male corpses.
Forty miles away in the provincial
capital of
Opposition Still
Exists To Women's Roles
In central
"Historically in northwestern
In the past decade, some women's
mosques have been established in northwest
Ariana Lindquist
for NPR
Women pray at a the Wangjia mosque
in
This is part of the anomaly that
is religion in
While there is broad support among
"The education of Islamic
women is a very important job," says Guo Baoguang, of the Islamic
Association of Kaifeng. But he admits that he has been criticized for
organizing religious education forums for Muslim men and women to take part in
together.
"There were some criticisms
that women ought to be in the home, and ought not take part in social
activities. I think these criticisms are too conservative, and don't account of
the importance of women's education in Islam," he says.
Guo believes that when it comes to
female imams,
"Given the fast development
of
Ariana Lindquist
for NPR
For Bai Yanlian becoming a female
imam took seven years of study, including three years of Arabic-language
training. She then had to take an exam to get a license from the state.
Greatest Challenge Is
Economic
In the women's mosques, most of
the faithful are elderly. Young women with families often don't have the time
to worship, especially given the lengthy purification rituals several times a
day.
Third-generation imam Sun
Chengying, who has been practicing for 21 years, worries about the future.
"I haven't had any students
since 1996," she says, shaking her head. "Women don't want be imams
anymore, because the salaries in the mosques are too low. No one is willing to
do it."
Female imams sometimes earn as
little as $40 a month, one-third of what can be earned in other jobs. Younger
women need to earn more to support their families.
And so it appears the future of
female imams in