THE WOMEN CONCERNED ARE UNAWAKENED
There is one thing to say: that, from our experience, Sudanese women are unaware of their own cause. For today’s educated women, employment is thought to be their cause, and their best aim is to receive equal wages with men “equal pay for equal work,” and to have maternity leave. They consider such things to be their cause. However, the real cause of women lies in the answer to the question: Are they householders, or are they just houseguests? We are totally powerless to draw the attention of educated women to this point, so they persist in calling for religion to revert to (the past) to solve their problem. In religion, there is a solution to women’s problem and within religion is their dignity, as they have absolutely no dignity elsewhere. Currently, our New Islamic Mission community is conscious of this cause, and is trying hard to address and settle it. Yet, other women are not conscious enough to take it up as their cause. This is one of the reasons that forced us to make this a closed session, hoping to be attended by some female guests to see that their real cause is for religion to be established, and their true dignity is when religion is established. But there will be no dignity for women in religion when it is based on that which theologians are calling for. Women cannot face up to theologians without proper religious understanding. That is because you, as a thoughtful civilly educated woman, when arguing based on mere civil logic, a theologian, just by citing a verse from the Quran or a hadith, can render you as helpless as a fish taken out of water. That is why there is an intellectual repression that influences women. It is the same intellectual repression that has influenced the minds of laity, in the name of religion.
We want women to rise up and be aware of their rights in religion, and to show that the view the clergy have is not the religion itself. Religion is what we have. We want you to tell them that, at the origin of religion, we have full dignity, as provided in the verse: “Women have rights similar to their corresponding obligations in fairness, while men are a degree above them” (2:128). In the phrase “Women have rights similar to their corresponding obligations” you can see how Islam was ahead in this regard. It is like the principle “equal pay for equal work” demanded by today’s unions. A present-day translation of the phrase “Women have rights similar to their corresponding obligations” can be: “equal pay for equal work.” That is to say, their rights correspond to their obligations. That is, if a woman was a judge who judicially serves the public and the community, her rights should be equal to the rights of her counterpart male judge. It seems inconceivable that a legal testimony of a female judge is worth half that of an average man. It is neither rationally nor religiously acceptable. It cannot be said to a female judge who studied law that your legal testimony is worth half that of a male court guard. No Way! You cannot tell her that the legal testimony of a male usher in her courthouse is perfectly adequate, while hers is half adequate. Although that is currently possible within the exoteric code, it is not religion. Since the exoteric code failed to keep pace with time, we want it to be reestablished, but not based on the ancient status, as today’s women are not the same as ancient women. You see, this is our cause, and this is what we are calling for. We are now demanding these rights for women in their absence, as the women concerned are yet to be awakened and are not taking part.
Currently, the Republican (New Islamic Mission) sisters are the wide-awake vanguard on this path, yet no one is listening to them. We want the female attendees of our guests to discuss our objective, and also to examine it carefully, as your dignity, and the dignity of your husbands, homes, and children, in this world and in the otherworld, is pinned on this objective. This objective is neither small talk, an intellectual luxury, nor is it idle chitchat. There will be no dignity without this objective, not in this world or in the otherworld.
What we have presented to you is an overview, but you can ask or discuss whatever you want. You do not have to abide by the issue that we raised here.
Thank you so much.
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The Republican Brothers
P.O. Box 1151, Omdurman
Telephone: 56912
First Edition Tuesday 11/11/1975
09 Dhul-Qadah 1395
Second Edition Sunday 19/12/1976
28 Dhul-Hijjah 1396
