12. 700-1200 The Golden Age of Islam

Paleo-anthropologists can track human evolution and migration in prehistory using the remains of women, which have provided some of the most important breakthroughs in our understanding of the past. There is great variation between hunter gatherer groups and the gender dynamics that emerged.

​Like most monotheistic religions, women were the first converts and were close to the prophet whose teachings are central to the faith. In the case of Islam, there is no Islam without women. From the very beginning, women were placed at the heart of Islam, as the Prophet Muhammad’s wife, Khadija - an older divorcee and financially independent business woman -  became “the first Muslim” as she was the first to believe and follow her husband’s revelations. Their daughter, Fatimah bint Muhammad, commonly known as Fatimah al-Zahra, was also especially revered even by the Prophet himself, who is said to have regarded her as the outstanding woman of all time, hence why she is now regarded as the ultimate example of Muslim womanhood for her compassion, generosity, and enduring suffering. So for Khadija and outstanding women everywhere, let’s examine the role of gender in the emerging Islamic faith and empire.

Context: As the old empire of Rome fractured and China entered into a Golden Age, the Middle of Eurasia saw a rebirth. In 622, a man called Muhammad claiming to be a prophet was forced to flee from Mecca to Medina, a city on the Arabian penninsula with his followers. Assassins were hot on his trail and an army was trying to wipe out his community, the first Muslims.

Muhammad had been trying to unite the various Meccan clans under monotheism. It was said that Muhammed had received revelations from the one, almighty God (Allah). He would become the main prophet to the religion– Islam. His wife, Khadija was an older, wealthy business woman, who bankrolled most of his efforts. Like Sarah in Judaism, and Mary in Christianity, Khadija was the first Muslim, or believer in Islam. 

Pretty soon after Muhammad starting sharing the revelations he received, they faced opposition and violence from the tribe that held commercial and political authority in the region, the Quraysh. Why? The Quraysh, like most tribes in that region, were pagans – worshiping many gods.  They feared the monotheistic message would hurt the trade that brought thousands of merchants and pilgrims to the shrine in Mecca (the Ka’ba) each year.  They feared losing power and wealth.

Early Gains for Women: Women were drawn to Muhammad and his message both spiritually and practically. A core tenet of Muhammad’s revelations was an emphasis on Charity. Men were encouraged to take in via marriage orphans, widows, and enslaved people as a type of social welfare for the society. In a desert culture where both the warrior mentality was everywhere and women without physical protection were vulnerable, taking multiple wives, it was argued, protected them from rape, violent assault, or death by warring tribesmen. Muhammed asked all Muslims to protect women and children as part of their duty to Allah. Men had a legal and religious obligation to care for their wives materially, sexually, and emotionally. He allowed women to enter into contracts by law, to seek custody of children after divorce, and frowned upon child marriage. 

Muhammad himself had multiple wives including child marriages. Muhammad’s third and “most beloved wife,” Aisha, was one of the most important figures in early Islam. She was the daughter of his longtime ally and friend, Abu Bakr. She was a child, probably nine, when she married him. Following his death, she became one of the most prominent contributors to the spread of his message, narrating 2,210 hadiths, not just on matters related to Muhammad's private life, but also on topics such as inheritance, pilgrimage, and the end times.

Perhaps the greatest achievement of early Islam when it came to women was it strict doctrine against female infanticide, or the killing of girl babies, which was commonplace in the Middle East, North Africa, and India. This preference for male babies was evidence of deep seeded misogyny in a society reliant on manual laborers and the belief that young girls are a burden.

Under Islam, women were given control over their own property, especially their dowries and inheritance, but their inheritance was half the rate of men. Islam enforced consent and so marriage by kidnapping was illegitimate. Divorce was possible for women although difficult to attain, it was more than in any faith to that date. 

Female Contemporaries: In its early years, Muslim women found incredible freedom and honor aligning with the Prophet Muhammad. Women who followed him  garnered protection and even offered protection. 

Nusaybah bint Ka’ab is famous for defending Muhammad in the Battle of Uhud, one of the early conflicts as Muhammad defended against the pagans from Mecca. Like a lot of women during war, Nusaybah was there to help and nurse the soldiers. At some point in the battle, the archers on the hill believed victory was in sight and abandoned their position leaving Muhammed and some of his followers vulnerable. Nusaybah grabbed weapons and stood between the Meccans and Muhammad. Muhammad described her in battle, “Wherever I turned, left or right, on the Day of Uhud — I saw her fighting for me.” 

She was wounded in twelve or more places and fainted from a major blow to the shoulder. When she recovered, her first words were to inquire about the health of Muhammad. She and dozens of other women participated in subsequent battles, and in some cases shared in the spoils of war. 

But like pretty much everywhere, as the Islamic civilization flourished and expanded, elite Muslim women saw their rights restricted socially and economically.

Death of Muhammad: When Muhammad died, Muslims were divided on the proper path for succession. Most favored Abu Bakr, Aisha’s father, while others prefered Khadija’s daughter Fatima’s husband: Ali. Abu Bakr succeeded Muhammad and began a war of conquest that continued after his death. Abu Bakr died of illness and the second Caliph, or leader, Umar continued the wars for expansion.

As the empire grew, women’s roles became more restricted. Umar told women that they must pray at home and veiling and seclusion became standard in Muslim society. The effect was to remove women from public life: social seclusion and segregation. Men and women prayed separately, women were not seen by unrelated men, so on and so forth. A  later caliph created social infrastructure in order to make women’s segregation more practical by building a bridge across the Euphrates river only for women. 

Being secluded became synonymous with being chaste, a symbol of one’s wealth and class. Poor Muslim women throughout the empire who lacked servants and slaves had to go to the market or to work and that could not be so secluded.

When the third caliph died, Ali again asserted his position as a rightful Caliph, but many still opposed him– including Aisha and several of Muhammad’s other widows.

Aisha is perhaps most famous for leading troops onto the battlefield to oppose Muhammad’s son-in-law for control of the Muslim Empire. Muhammad’s other wives notably did not join her, believing a widow’s place was in seclusion. Aisha fought in the “Battle of the Camel” to protect Islam and the honor of the chosen successor (Uthman) who was assassinated.  This massive battle cost thousands of Muslims their lives and represented an emerging rift between the Sunni and Shia Muslims. The battle ended only after Aisha’s camel was hamstrung and killed, and she was captured. She was spared by the mercy of Ali and marched humiliated to her home. Ali went on to become the fourth Caliph of Islam.

But Aisha did not shy away, she just rebranded. She retreated to Medina, opened a school and became a teacher. Privately, Aisha continued influencing those intertwined in the Islamic political sphere. Among the Islamic community, she was known as an intelligent woman who debated law with male companions. For the last years of her life, Aisha spent much of her time telling the stories of Muhammad.



The Quran: In the years after Muhammad’s passing, his revelations would be recorded by his followers in the form of a single book called the Quran. The Quran is explicit in its intent that men and women were spiritually equal. The text uses gender inclusive language such as, “those who surrender themselves to Allah and except the true Faith; who are devout, sincere, patient, humble, charitable, and chaste; who fast in a never mind full of Allah— on these, both men and women, all I will bestow forgiveness and rich reward.” 

But socially, Islam could not alone battle the cultural norms across many communities in the growing Islamic empire. And the Quran also limited womens mortal experience especially within marriage. One passage made evident the subordination stating, “men have authority over women because Allah has made the one superior to the other, and because they spend their wealth to maintain them. Good women are obedient.” 

Within marriage, the Quran banned women from taking multiple husbands while permitting men to have multiple wives– women were not providers. This reinforced a patriarchal lineage and ownership of wives and children, or chattel. Men could only have up to four wives and had to treat each of them equally. Many people interpret this as basically impossible, so it therefore virtually requires monogamy. Men were allowed to have sex with enslaved women, but any children those women birthed were free. 

Despite the numerous female contributors to the haddith, the denigration of the female sex was evident in the lack of schooling and female produced writings following the early period. While the Quran said heaven was at a mother’s feet, other passages have been interpreted as permitting husbands to discipline their wives, as prioritizing males’ legal testimony over a woman’s, and as proscribing violent punishments for adultery. For example, “Women are like fields for you; so seed them as you intend, but… remember, you have to face Allah  in the end.” (The Quran THE COW, 2:223)

While the physical control of women may have been common in many Middle Eastern cultures in the 600s (in Christian and Jewish societies as well) passages like this are absent in other sacred texts from those traditions. 

Beyond the Quran, later Muslims also recorded the Hadith, or a collection of traditions and daily practices attributed to Muhammad. Some Hadiths are respected more than others based on who recorded them and how far back one could trace the Hadith. Overtime, Hadith became increasingly hostile to women– almost contrary to the history known about Muhammad’s treatment of women. 

Female Scholars: Aisha was not the only female scholar who contributed to Islamic texts and literature. One analyst found that, “most of the important compilers of hadith from the earliest period received many of them from women teachers, as the immediate authorities. Ibn Hajar studied from 53 women; As-Sakhawi had ijazas from 68 women and As-Suyuti studied from 33 women, a quarter of his shuyukh.” Historians estimate more than 8,000 female Islamic scholars of note.  

Women who memorized the teachings of Muhammad were often consulted by legal scholars, wrote petitions, entered opinions in the public sphere and were mentioned by biographers, dictionaries, and debates of the day. To establish authenticity and authority, scholars kept track of lineages– noting which scholars mentored which schools and recorded “chains of transmission.” Oral histories which retold these chains served to strengthen legitimacy and helped build professional associations.  

Sayiida Nafisa who lived a century after Muhammad, was famous for her devotion and asceticism. Living with almost no material goods, in semi-seclusion, she and other Musim women scholars memorized thousands of Hadiths. Nafisa gave lectures at mosques, blessings to weary travelers on Hajj, and performed miracles. Nafisa helped prisoners and the hungry. She was revered even after her death as a holy woman, and masses visited her shrine. She is one of the patron saints of the city of Cairo in Egypt.

Rabi’a was a Sufi Muslim poet whose ideas demonstrated persistent feminist inklings within the increasingly restrictive faith. One poem attributed to her demonstrated her pure devotion to Islam. She wrote:
O my Lord, if I worship you
from fear of hell, burn me in hell.
If I worship you from hope of Paradise, 
bar me from its gates.
But if I worship you for yourself alone, 
grant me then the beauty of your Face.

Still, women scholars and teachers were less common in this period as most women (of all faiths) were illiterate. A Muslim woman was more likely to be educated in places like Al Andalusa (Muslim Spain) than her Christian counterparts were. But that was only among the elites.  

One particularly hostile, and frequently quoted Hadith– yet weakly attributed to Muhammad was: “Never will succeed such a nation as makes a woman their ruler.” Aisha’s defeat only helped solidify these ideas… and yet women continued to rule Islamic kingdoms as consorts through the Golden Age of Islam. 

Umayyad and Abbasid Empires: During the subsequent Umayyad and Abbasid Empires women served as teachers, preachers, philanthropists, patrons, scholars and jurists. Sufi women especially were often wealthy property holders who built houses of worship, schools, feeding houses, and shrines to Muslim saints in order to care for the poor and use their influence to better society.

Women were involved in assassination plots, arranged marriages to consolidate wealth and power, collaborated with investors and patrons to support the arts, build schools, houses of worship, shrines, led armies, flouted dishonest viziers, pirates and social climbers and masterminded sacred festivals and spectacles of devotion to gain influence.   Showing piety and highlighting devotion via service and networks of the faithful guaranteed many women special status in the landscape of power in this period.
 
The Abbasid Empire was a period of great land expansion for the Caliphate. The capital city of Baghdad grew and embraced immigrants from around the Muslim world, including Christians, Jews, Hindus and Zoroastrians– tolerance and openness typical of Golden Ages. Most women belonged to families of farmers and traders, and in many areas, common women were likely subject to enslavement during territorial expansion.
 
Al-Khayzuran was the wife of al-Mahdi the Caliph. Like other Queens and Empresses of the period around the world, Al-Khayzuran was enslaved to a wealthy master who trained her in the arts, sciences, mathematics, theology and Islamic law. This made her more educated than most women in the world at the time, and more than most men in her society. She was sold as a concubine to the future Caliph. Harems in Muslim culture differed greatly from those found in East Asia. Only the elite men could afford them and their wives and concubines were active in politics and managed their own business. In this environment, Al-Lhayzuran’s wit and aptitude for leadership was shown and she found his favor. She convinced him to free her and make her his legitimate wife. When he ascended to leadership she maintained the lady-like seclusion expected of an elite woman. At court, she sat behind a screen and listened in on matters of state. She often quarreled with the Caliph and did not hesitate to confront him on important issues. 
She had two sons who succeeded their father as Caliphs. Her son did not like being controlled by his mother and at one point angrily rebutted, “Don’t you have a spindle to keep you busy, a Quran for praying, a residence in which to hide from those besieging you? Watch yourself, and woe to you if you open your mouth in favor of anyone at all.”
 
Failure to submit to her rule led to Al-Khayzuran having her son murdered. Her second son assumed the role of Caliph and happily shared power with his mother. His rule was arguably the most powerful of the Abbasids, and his mother is considered by most historians to be the power– quite literally– “behind” the throne. Although Caliphs were expected to be stoic, he wept openly when his mother died. 
 
The Abassid’s declined and were replaced by the Fatimid Empire, who claimed to be descendants from Muhammad’s daughter. Here more powerful women thrived. Sitt al-Mulk (who’s mother was a concubine– just to keep the theme). She was favored by her father, had a military at her disposal, and donated lavishly to charity. Customary of Fatimid leaders, she never married, so that her brother’s line would be uncontested. But after she arranged for her brother’s disappearance or death, she served as regent for his young son. She was a firm ruler and stayed in power until her death in 1023. 
 
Al-Khayzuran and Sitt al-Mulk’s involvement in assasination plots is a very familiar trope of female leaders. Why are female rulers portrayed as conniving assassins of their rivals? Were they as evil as portrayed? Or was it a pattern of narrative that later chroniclers resorted to in order to frame power in the hands of women as something unearned or unacceptable?
 
Not all Queens were portrayed that way. Queen Arwa was an orphan adopted by the king and queen of Yemen. She married the crowned prince, but he became paralyzed. Arwa served as de facto ruler. She focused her attention on the citizens welfare building schools, roads, mosques, and affectionately earned the name “Little Queen of Sheba” by her people.

Conclusion: By 900 Islam spread to include most of the Middle East and northern Africa. By 1300 it had expanded to include most of the Sahara and East coast of Africa, and northern India. By 1500 it had encroached into Europe, modern day Russia, and further into India. When the Mongols sacked Baghdad, the capital of the Arab Empire, the strength of Islam as a faith shown because the religion and Arabic in which most texts were recorded continued to expand even though the empire fractured.

The west African empires of Ghana, Mali, Songhai, Hausa states, and Bornu embraced Islam and boasted hundreds of Quaranic schools and universities. But wherever Islam went, it melded with the local culture. When the world traveler Ibn Battuta came to Mali, he was appalled that practicing Muslims allowed their women to appear in public almost naked and mingle freely with men outside their families. In reply to his remark, one Mali man told him “they are not like the women of your country.” 

As the Islamic Empire spread, cultural diffusion and integration occurred. Practices in certain localities such as “honor killing“ of women by their male relatives when they were dishonored were practiced in the name of Islam even though Islam never called for it. Elsewhere, clitorectomy became common. This was the practice of cutting and sewing a woman’s vagina to make it painful to have sex to enforce chastity. This was also not prescribed in the Quran or Islamic law, but nevertheless existed where Islam existed.

The early years of Islam garnered women many freedoms and protections that had not existed in Arab clans, but those were challenged as the small faith grew into a series of massive empires. Like most places, elite women were policed more than lower class women– and all women found themselves subordinate to men.

[Setting up the Inquiry] By the end of this era, so much remained in question. Could Islam maintain it’s thriving culture? Would women continue to maintain their respected positions as scholars? Or would they be sidelined by patriarchal institutions?

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Bibliography

Ali, Adam. “Slave, Queen, and Mother of Caliphs: The Story of Khayzuran.” Medievalists. April, 2019. https://www.medievalists.net/2019/04/slave-queen-and-mother-of-caliphs-the-story-of-khayzuran/.

Armstrong Karen. 2000. Islam : A Short History Modern Library ed. New York: Modern Library.

Britannica, T. Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Fatimid dynasty." Encyclopedia Britannica, July 12, 2021. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Fatimid-dynasty.

Lumen Editors. “Muhammad’s Sucessors.” Lumen Learning. N.D. https://courses.lumenlearning.com/suny-hccc-worldcivilization/chapter/muhammads-successors/. 

Miles, Rosalind. The Women’s History of the World. London, UK: Harper Collins Publishers, 1988.

Poetry Foundation Editors. “Rabi'a.” Poetry Foundation. N.D. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/rabia.

​​Strayer, R. and Nelson, E., Ways Of The World. 3rd ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2016.

Women’s Islamic Initiative in Spirituality Editors. “Queen Arwa al-Sulayhi.” Women’s Islamic Initiative in Spirituality. N.D. https://www.wisemuslimwomen.org/muslim-woman/queen-arwa-al-sulayhi-2/.

Primary AUTHOR:

Kelsie Brook Eckert and
​Dr. Whitney Howarth

Primary Reviewer:

Dr. Shahla Haeri

Consulting Team

Editors

Kelsie Brook Eckert, Project Director
Coordinator of Social Studies Education at Plymouth State University

Dr. Nancy Locklin-Sofer, Consultant
Professor of History at Maryville University. 

Chloe Gardner, Consultant
PhD Candidate in Religious Studies at Edinburgh University

Dr. Whitney Howarth, Consultant
Former Professor of History at Plymouth State University

Jacqui Nelson, Consultant
Teaching Lecturer of Military History at Plymouth State University

​Maria Concepcion Marquez Sandoval
PhD Candidate in History at Arizona University

Amy Flanders
Humanities Teacher, Moultonborough Academy
Ron Kaiser
Humanities Teacher, Moultonborough Academy
Chris Canfield
Humanities Teacher, Moultonborough Academy

Reviewers

Ancient:
Dr. Kristin Heineman
Professor of History at Colorado State University
Dr. Bonnie Rock-McCutcheon
Professor of History at Wilson College
Sarah Stone
PhD Candidate in Religious Studies at Edinburgh University
Medieval:
Dr. Katherine Koh
Professor of History at La Sierra University
Dr. Jonathan Couser
Professor of History at Plymouth State University
Dr. Shahla Haeri
Professor of History at Boston University 
Lauren Cole
PhD Candidate in History at Northwestern University
Modern:
Dr. Jack Gronau
Professor of History at Northeastern University