Focus on Women |
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| The Feminine Path: | Women Talk about Spirituality and Religion |
Coming to IslamBy Dana Hubler A profile of Muslim scholar Alexandra Bain, this month's cover personality. Alexandra Bain grew up with an awareness of the presence of God. As she became older, the Christianity she was raised with appeared less consistent and less meaningful to her. While living in Montreal, Alexandra, then 24, met a group of Muslims from Trinidad and discovered a religion that was new to her --- Islam. "When I read the Qur'an, it didn't have all the inconsistencies I'd found in the Bible. I'd hit the wall trying to bring myself closer to God through Christianity, but the Islamic goal of removing your ego to let God in made sense to me," recalls Alexandra, now 40 and the single mother of three children. "It felt very comfortable for me to make the switch." |
| As a Muslim, Alexandra follows and Islamic spiritual
tradition known as Sufism. She is a murid, or disciple,
of Shaykh Hisham Kabbani, the North American leader of
the 1,400-year-old Naqshbandi Sufi order. Raising awareness and breaking down stereotypes have been two of her roles in the local Muslim community. "When I present myself as a Muslim, I'm not what most people expect --- I don't have a beard; I don't have a gun. The challenge is to ask people to rethink the stereotypes of Muslims they see through the media..." The Muslim concept of men being 'over' women is largely misunderstood, she says. While many non-Muslims interpret this phrase to mean men are superior, Alexandra offers an insider's view. "In Islamic society, everyone is responsible for the protection and maintenance of somebody else. That doesn't mean they're intellectually or spiritually superior." Women are encouraged to become educated and may own property and carry on business, she says. In fact, the prophet Muhammad's first wife "was a businesswoman who proposed to Muhammad." Their marriage lasted 25 years. The problems, Alexandra maintains, come not from the religion itself, but from individual and cultural interpretations of it. "The colonial experience --- because most Muslim countries experienced colonialism --- was a big factor and that has left them with gaps between rich and poor, men and women..." Alexandra is currently working on her Ph.D. in Islamic Art and Architecture at the University of Victoria. She earned a fellowship from UVic's Centre for Studies in Religion and Society in 1995, the first time a graduate student has received this award. This summer, she will travel to Istanbul to pursue her doctoral research on Islamic Art and Architecture. While working on her thesis, Alexandra has taught summer courses for two years. Beginning this May and then again in September, she will teach a new course, which she wrote, in Islamic Art and Spirituality. Teaching remains a great love for her. "I was just studying and researching, but then I taught a class and I just dropped dead with joy," she says. "God's greatest gift to us is our mind and our ability to think critically, I love giving my students the tools to question." (Dana Hubler is a Victoria writer. Her work was featured in West Coast Women 1996.) |
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