Married to Muhammed

Yesterday I picked up W.L. Cati's book "Married to Muhammed," which is an American woman's story of marrying a Syrian man.

According to the Qur'an, Cati's husband had the responsibility to admonish her, the right to desert her sexually, and the right to beat her to correct her rebellious behavior (which was her conversion to Christianity). I found some elements in her story sad, and others fascinating, including her description of her Muslim wedding ceremony.

During Muslim wedding ceremonies, the bride and groom are taken into separate rooms and questioned. The bride is asked three times if she is being forced to marry. Each time she says "no," part of the marriage contract is fulfilled. The bride's father has to sign various papers so the "transaction" of his daughter into the care of another man will be official. After the honeymoon, the couple will often live with the husband's parents, and his mother has authority over the new wife.

I found the picture above on a Muslim matrimonial website, accompanied by the explanation that, in an effort to combat immorality, the Egyptian government is financing mass weddings. The girls in the picture are wearing dresses borrowed from a government-aligned charity, and are awaiting a mass ceremony held last fall in Idku, Egypt. Many of them know little more about their almost-husband than his name.

Muslim men and women view marriage as a duty appointed by Allah, with the man's duty to engender children and "maintain" his women, and his wife's (or wives') duty to be clean, obedient, and available to her husband at all times (Al-Bukhari, 18). I am not saying that all Muslim marriages are loveless contracts made by two strangers. My initial impression of Islam, as a woman who believes Galatians 3:28, is that it is religion that divorces love from sex and replaces unity with servitude.

Christian men are called to love their wives as Christ loved the Church - to the point of dying for her. Christian women are urged to respect their husbands, and submit to his leadership (Ephesians 5:25). Both are called to avoid all arguing and complaining, to be patient, gentle, and self-controlled, and to submit to each other out of reverence for Christ. There is no male dominance, but rather servant leadership.

I want a more complete grasp of doctrines in Islam pertaining to male/female relationships, but at this point it appears that a loving marriage between a Muslim man and woman is in spite of Islamic teaching, not because of it.