Do any Muslim sects permit or even tolerate female clergy or imams, here or anywhere around the world? Does the Koran flatly prohibit female clergy, or is it more a matter of ethnic/national/social custom?
Officially, Islam does not have a professional clergy. There is no “ordination”. An imam can simply be one who leads a group in a prayer, or it can be one who’s job is to serve as the regular, permanent imam and spiritual leader at a masjid, or anything in-between.
Women can lead other women in prayers, but cannot lead men or a mixed group in fard (required 5x/day) prayers. There are a number of women that give lectures on religious subjects to mixed groups.
Yes. In Ismailism, a rather liberal branch of Shia Islam, two women and two men are appointed to lead each congregation. They act rather like lay clergy; there is no formal training school to be appointed, rather one just must be a member in good standing to be considered. This happens world-wide in the Ismaili community, and as we regard the Aga Khan as the leader of the Ismaili community, he is the one who has the last say on who is appointed to the lay clergy positions. They act not just to lead the congregation in prayer, but also in a pastoral capacity. Additionally in Ismailism, a woman can be called upon to lead the entire congregation in prayer (not just the women) and a women can go through the formal training required to lecture and educate the congregation on aspects of practice and interpretation of faith.
However, bear in mind that the Ismailis are a very very liberal sect of Islam.
Yahbut, I’m not sure there’s a reliable correlation between “religious liberalism” and “willingness to accept female clergy”. Roman Catholicism, for instance, is pretty liberal in some of its doctrines compared to other Christian sects (e.g., in accepting evolutionary theory), but still doesn’t ordain women. The Salvation Army, on the other hand, is quite doctrinally conservative in many respects but does ordain women. Go figure.
Similarly, there seems to be some disagreement even among mainstream Islamic authorities about the acceptability of women leading a mixed congregation in prayer:
Off the top of my head, I would not necessarily have described the Egyptian Grand Mufti as doctrinally more “liberal” than the folks at Al-Azhar, but one of them thinks female imamat are permitted by Islamic doctrine, even for mixed congregations, and the other doesn’t. Go figure.
Yeah, but the OP didn’t ask about mainstream Islam, just Islam in general, and asked for any sect at all in Islam that allowed women to lead prayers and the congregation on an equal footing to men. The Ismailis do.