Kitabkhana: Let it bleed

Life happened because I turned the pages~~Alberto Manguel

Sunday, August 01, 2004

Let it bleed

One of the Babu's closest friends hated the religious proscriptions on menstruating women implacably; she found a measure of relief in entering temples on "forbidden days" while humming the Stones lyrics:
"We all need someone we can bleed on
And if you want it, baby, well you can bleed on me
We all need someone we can bleed on
And if you want it, why don’t you bleed on me?"
She said she'd really, really vibe well with a god/ goddess who might be prepared to sing this back for her. I'm hoping she's reading this, because she's going to love 'Lost Pages from Sahih al-Bukhari’s Chapter on Menstruation' by Mohja Kahf:
"And Our Mother Hava (Eva) also said: One last thing before I leave. You may hear ugly stories about me in later times of darkness but do not believe them. I, your grandmother, who loves you even though you are yet unborn except in my hopes, tell you: Verily, your period is not a curse but a blessing. It is one of the Signs of God, so learn to read it.
And Hazrat Bint Hawwa remarked, commenting on the words of Our Mother, and explaining in a different way the refraining from namaz during menses: You do not need to pray during your period only because your bleeding is prayer. Not because it is pollution—they got it wrong, it is the other way around. It is prayer so powerful that people, if they knew, would come and touch the feet of the menstruating woman. It is the manifestation of the sacred role women are given, no matter if some of them choose to bear children and some not; for even those who do not bear children participate in the monthly rites. Contemplation of this can lead to elevated spiritual states.
And she (MSBGP—may she be given pleasure) said: Listen. This is what it sounds like to hear words that love women. Words that need no excuses and explanations. Words that do not make women curl up and die inside.
And those present raised their hands and said: Teacher, can I recite Quran when I have my period? Can I touch the Quran? What about a translation of the Quran? Can I pick it up if I am dusting the shelf? Can I recite a whole sura or part of a sura? Can I recite a whole aya or part of an aya? Can I recite a dua if I am in fear? Can I recite kul a’uthu bi rab al-nas if I am in need of it? Must I keep silent?
And the teacher said, these are the questions of women living in shame. These are not the questions of those accustomed to being honored."

8 Comments:

Just wonderin',

Going to a mandir on 'forbidden days' while humming a Stones song. Ask your friend, what's the point of 'epater les bourgeois' if, well, the 'bourgeois' aren't aware of it ?

Anonymous Hindooo

By Anonymous, at 8/01/2004 05:27:00 AM

... ummmm ... no doubt I speak for a minority ... but in my opinion, any god, goddess, godling, godlet or whatever who devised monthly bleeding as a form of default-prayer-mechanism in women certainly deserves to be replaced by MTV. I continue to believe that He/She/It was in a very bad mood when He/She/It designed mammalian reproduction.

By Manjula Padmanabhan, at 8/01/2004 10:20:00 PM

Always thought Human Design must've been the product of outsourcing to a shyster of a contractor who didn't even have the right specs :)
Interesting you should ask about my friend, Anonymous. She ended up campaigning for women's rights in a far stronger--and more public--way, and she's still going strong (she's in her late thirties now). I take your point about the private gesture of rebellion being lost if it remains private: but I think it meant a lot to her, and it certainly shook up those of us who were younger than her at school. Made us think, even if a few of us, and even if a little bit, about matters we would have glossed over otherwise. I don't think it was entirely wasted; though I'd love to see an army of women doing a Gimme Red! in an organised sort of way at the country's biggest temples.
She did, briefly, tangle with the priests directly, but that's another story.

By Hurree, at 8/02/2004 12:42:00 AM

Jes' wonderin'...

Lemme bracket the glorious mess that is the Indian constitution to ask you (and your friend): Is it really a right [Deva-given or natural or otherwise] for anyone to attend a particular mandir/synagogue/church/prayer lodge ?

Membership/attendance issues are best left to religious organizations to determine. While freedom of religion is a fundamental right, so is freedom of association.

That is, if one is interested in changing the practices of a [non-Western] religious tradition, it's better not to frame the issue in [usually Western] legal terms. Rather, the appeal ought to be made in terms internal to that tradition.

Anonymous Hindooo
P.S., the 'adaptive value' of menstruation in the Darwinian sense is a very active, fascinating area of biological research.

By Anonymous, at 8/02/2004 01:51:00 AM

Many of the rules that govern religion and religious worship are so strongly anti-women that they should be questioned, even--okay, especially by--the faithful. A temple to me is a house of god; if that temple decides it's going to exclude Dalits, on the grounds that they aren't touchable enough, or women during certain times of the month, what it demonstrates to me is human, not godly, prejudices.
This has very little to do with "Western" or "Eastern" concepts of liberty or justice; I'd say these concepts are universal. I'm glad you raised these issues, though, because it raises the age-old question of the line between faith and practice. Any temple that would shut women out because they're bleeding demonstrates, to me, just a deeprooted priestly fear of female fertility. Manjula Padmanabhan put it very well in a short story, Stains:
"Once you entered the logic of clean and unclean blood, you could find your way around the maze fairly easily, thought Sarah. The bleeding woman is penalized for being in that "state": the correct condition, of course, is to be pregnant or nursing."
A true house of god would open its doors to anyone who felt the need for spiritual communion. It doesn't seem too much to ask that those doors might not be bolted shut and opened only a crack for the "right" kind of seeker.

By Hurree, at 8/02/2004 05:23:00 PM

... ah but: institutions are free (broadly) to devise rules to their taste and/or tradition. If temples want to keep people out on some pretext or the other, they are free to do so -- and the devotees of that religion are free (though most don't realize it!) to decide they don't want to belong to a religion that practices discrimination along menstrual (to name just one) grounds.

In this sense, I do think your friend's personality was complex -- in an interesting and likeable way -- because she had enough faith to enter a temple, but not enough to accept traditional ideas regarding menstruation. In my view, anyone who has come up to the threshhold of questioning these practices has actually crossed over it and out into the godless world -- because traditional religions don't really want questions at all. Just to believe that men and women are 'equal' (whatever THAT means!) is sort of anti-traditional, so I am always amazed there are so many feminists who also claim to be fervent believers in whatever tradition they belong to.

By Manjula Padmanabhan, at 8/03/2004 11:33:00 PM

You have a point there; I see some of that struggle reflected in Mohja's work (Mohja Kahf; several of her short stories are up at www.muslimwakeup.com). Or in the actions of Asra Nomani, who's been campaigning in the US for equal space for women in mosques.
The thing that gets me about religion is this: of the major revealed religions, none had a female prophet, or a female "leader" in that sense. Female priests, yes, female acolytes, certainly, female deities--yup, put them up on a pedestal and you don't have to think about what flesh-and-blood women need to go through.
Thought about this absence--a fairly large one given the antiquity of organised religion, don't you think? And concluded that one of two things must've happened. Either god didn't see it fit to reveal His words to a woman on the grounds that women are somehow not holy enough, or worthy enough--in which case, why would women want to follow a religion that held them in such contempt?
Or--given that we've had women seers and women oracles and women prophetesses--somewhere down the line, the Cassandra complex kicked in. The word of god was revealed, at some stage, to women, or to a woman; but when she set forth to spread it, everyone told her to shut up. :)
On your point that feminism might be incompatible with organised faith--as opposed, I'd suggest, to belief or to spirituality--perhaps you might want to go further and consider that feminist men would have an equal problem committing to any organised religion. What do you think?

By Hurree, at 8/04/2004 12:46:00 AM

Well....

What Marginalien said, at least in the first para...To put it more formally, I wasn't disputing (or agreeing) with your characterization of the nature of (some) Hindu practices. Rather, I simply wished to point out that mandirs, like any other organization in a free society, have the right to determine their membership and practices. Those who disagree with a religions' policies are free to leave, picket, proselytise , etc.

But let me address two substantive points in Marginalien's and your post, in order. Marginalien writes that 'traditional religions' [whatever does either word in that phrase mean M. ? But you seem I'm literally bracketing this question ;) ] don't encourage questioning. In context, I take it Marginalien means Hindoos.

But really, that can't be right. Think of the skeptical questions asked--by ordinary folk--after many traditional recitations of the Ramayana, say. Or, think of the entirely indigenous criticism of Shree Rama's treatment of Sita in e.g., many Sanskrit plays. Yet more--the traditional and vigorous argument and counter-argument in the shastras (Mimamsa, Nyaya etc.) is several thousand yrs. old. I grant you that the idea was to defend tradition in many cases, but still there was a serious and rigorous consideration of an opponents' views.

And Hurree, many people join you in distinguishing between '(organized) religion' and 'spirituality'. But I've yet to come across a pricnipled way to distinguish the two. Rather, these phrases are lobbed at one tradition by adherents of another tradition--at least it seems that way to me.

Anonymous Hindoo

By Anonymous, at 8/05/2004 03:13:00 AM

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Sunday, August 01, 2004

Let it bleed

8 Comments: