The “veil”: the hazards of multiculturalism and an identity crisis
One of the Quranic references on the matter of the veil is in Surah “The Confederates” (33, 59). The term used here is jalâbîb (plural of jilbâb). In her book The Veil and the Male Elite: A Feminist Interpretation of Islam, Fatima Mernissi writes of the twofold symbolic value of the veil: on the one hand it protects women from other people's scrutiny, on the other hand, it sacralises them. For Asma Lamrabet, this “veil” is only meant for the women mentioned in that verse (“O Prophet! Say to your wives, your daughters....”). Historically, starting from the Abbasid caliphate, wearing this item of clothing became the rule for Muslim women. At the time, it was common practice in conquered Persia and had been earlier still in Assyria where the seclusion of women and harems also prevailed. Whereupon these conquered societies' customs overlapped with the interpretation of some Quranic commentators.
Larambet decries the reduction of the debate about women's status to the mere issue of their dress code. For her, women's emancipation and the recovery of their rights are more important. She asserts that the body, whether male or female, it at the centre of an ethical-moral set of problems extant in every society in the world. Thus, the West has evinced a tendency to idolise the body and more particularly to promote a feminine ideal that, peddled by the media and advertising, reduces women to the status of consumption goods, a body and nothing but. The Muslim world, driven by its culture, has reacted, she suggests, with a move to withhold the female body.
Running her analysis in the light of the Quranic source, Asma Lamrabet asserts that the decision to cover one's body and head answers a spiritual conviction rather than a socio-cultural diktat. Furthermore she avers that the word hijab[1] is not suitable to refer to women's dress for it is not in fact a garment. She quotes verse 26 of Surah 7 “The heights” which discusses the dress and appearance of all and sundry: “O ye children of Adam! We have bestowed raiment upon you to cover your shame [...] but the raiment of righteousness (taqwa) that is the best.” She reminds her readers that covering one's nudity is one of humanity's first moral precepts. The Surah enables her to affirm the superiority of interiority on dress and appearance. The modesty and moderation advocated by the Quran are a fine expression of respect for the Other's body within a culture that idolises the body and extreme pleasure
