# Islam and sexual self-control **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 22, 2002, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217 "2002-11-22T19:58:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/21 "2002-11-23T13:15:29Z")
Uh, erm. Perhaps you should read a bit more regading Mohammad’s “six year old wife”. Paedephilia is a bit of a stretch here. I sincerely doubt the union was consumated till \*\*much[/]b] later. Mohamud had many wives. It was politics. Read your history. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/22 "2002-11-23T13:33:53Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by wireless \* > \*\*this seems inherently in conflict with some of the basic tenets of the religion, including 1) free will (Remember the “jihad” discussions? how jihad can also mean the struggle with oneself to be a better person/muslim?), and 2) equality among men/people. Furthermore, even if #1 is believed to be true, shouldn’t the “corrective action” be aimed at the _men_? Why put the onus on the women? > … > analysis of inherent inconsistancies… \*\* Good call. **wireless** , you have put your finger on the crux of the issue. This is the nexus around which the debates currently going on in Islam are turning. (Was anyone aware that Muslims are busy debating amongst themselves and are not just a monolithic bloc?) The liberal side of Islam has always seen the freewill and equality principles as central to the meaning of life. Key principles of the religion. They point to how often the Qur’an says “Think for yourself” But the hardshell types feel uncomfortable with these liberal principles and place their emphasis on the most restrictive rules they can come up with. Even when their high degree of restrictiveness was not present in the original release. The liberals see the essence of Islam as appealing to the better side of human nature. The hardshell Muslims are like the hardshell Christian fundamentalists who always dwell on the depravity of humans. But this attitude belongs in principle more with Christianity, because of the doctrine of the Fall and Original Sin: humans are inherently depraved and are all destined for Hell if not for the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross. The Qur’anic view of humanity is that humans are inherently good, but imperfect (“humans were created weak”). The emphasis is more on the innate goodness of humanity instead of the sinfulness: eternal reward in Paradise is your birthright, as long as you don’t totally screw it up, it’s yours to lose. Islam rejects the doctrine of Original Sin: “No soul bears the burden of another.” The hardshells get more attention because they raise a bigger stink. The liberals are nice, polite people, so they get ignored by the media. Traditional Islam, especially, places a high priority on respectfulness, courtesy, and a calm demeanor, so the majority of Muslims in real life are too nice and polite to make a big stink. Those who do are regarded as aberrant … but that’s all the media ever report about. Liberal Muslims include President Mohammad Khatami of Iran, ex-president Abdurrahman Wahid of Indonesia, and ex-deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim of Malaysia. They have been trying to appeal to the good side of human nature. They are very nice people, which is why their hardball political enemies were able to stomp all over them. **Slithy Tove** ’s remarks, though tongue in cheek, did bring up a valid point. Islam as practiced in Southeast Asia (Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, southern Philippines) never veiled women and allowed them social equality, because that was the culture of the people when they converted to Islam. Islam in Southeast Asia never had that uptight puritanical hardshell attitude. I think the Middle East ought to learn from their example. Also, most of the Americans, Canadians, and British converting to Islam in droves are bringing that liberal spirit into the worldwide colloquy on the nature of Islam. Eventually they will bring about a moderating influence if the world doesn’t descend into the Hobbesian madness of the war-of-all-against-all before then. There is a cool new book by the British intellectual Tariq Ali, [_The Clash of Fundamentalisms_](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1859846793/qid=1038058293/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_1/103-3534675-2728609?v=glance&s=books&n=507846). (Check out the cover picture of Shrub as a fundie mulla.) His thesis is that the rightwing Christian fundies of America and the extremist Muslim fundies have turned the world into their battleground, as though those were the only two options, they feed off each other, and they make the rest of us liberals on both sides suffer. I think the liberals of all sides the world around ought to link up and support one another, and take back the world, because Bush and Bin Ladin and their ilk have hijacked the world. ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/23 "2002-11-23T14:05:00Z")
Jomo - this was essentially my point - that “that version” of Islam is unlikely to prosper today and that it’s hopelessly archaic. However, you have brought up the larger question of how it might be diminished in its effects and influence, and I am not as sanguine as you seem to be about “taking back the world.” As the results of the recent election show, there’s a large number of people who buy into the Christian president’s view of the rest of the world. When the radical muslim clerics in the Middle East rant and rave about the US satans, Bush calls on their leaders to reject their words, or be seen as complicitious with them. But when the leading and prominent fundamentalist Christians here rant and rave about Islam, he is silent. He could just as easily make pronouncements that these people do not speak for the great majority of Americans nor for the government. Unfortunately, he’s not that kind of leader, and that’s probably not true. Liberal is bad word today, despite its great history and its actual denotation in the dictionary. And most of them are hiding under rocks for some reason. ---
**Author:** ![Eidolon909](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ce7236/32.png) [@Eidolon909](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eidolon909)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/24 "2002-11-23T14:17:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Beeblebrox \* > \*\*Uh, erm. Perhaps you should read a bit more regading Mohammad’s “six year old wife”. Paedephilia is a bit of a stretch here. I sincerely doubt the union was consumated till \*\*much[/]b] later. Mohamud had many wives. It was politics. Read your history. \*\* Beg your pardon. He married her at 6. Hadith says he fucked her at 9. That make a big enough of a difference for you? ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/25 "2002-11-23T15:37:41Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Skammer \* > \*\ ***RTA** , those are good examples of Christians getting angry about blasphemy, but I think it re-enforces the point of the OP. In the cases you cited, no one got killed. \*\* Yes, but that was mainly because they were in a developed, first world country. Try pulling that in a less developed Christian nation like southern Sudan and my guess is people are killed. It’s a societal thing more than a religious thing. Same with the veil, as has been pointed out. [quote] _Originally posted by Eidolon909_ **Well, it was a ridiculous thing to say. Mohammad wouldn’t marry them because they are women. Mohammad was a pedophile. His wife was 6 years old.** And how old were his other wives? Just out of curiosity. ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/26 "2002-11-23T15:39:58Z")
Well crap. Can a mod fix that? ---
**Author:** ![apotheosis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ba8739/32.png) [@apotheosis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/apotheosis)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/27 "2002-11-23T15:51:27Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Eidolon909 \* > \*\*He married her at 6. Hadith says he fucked her at 9. That make a big enough of a difference for you? \*\* Hell yes, it does…9 is **WAY** past a 6-year-old’s bedtime. ---
**Author:** ![Eidolon909](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ce7236/32.png) [@Eidolon909](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eidolon909)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/28 "2002-11-23T16:04:53Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Neurotik \* > \*\*And how old were his other wives? Just out of curiosity. \*\* Their ages varied but Hazarat Ayesha was his favourite and the youngest. He was 53 when he married her. She was 5-6. ---
**Author:** ![Eidolon909](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ce7236/32.png) [@Eidolon909](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eidolon909)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/29 "2002-11-23T16:10:10Z")
His first wife was Sawdah, a widow. She was 50. Ayesha was his second wife and the daughter of his closest friend, Abu Bakr. ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/30 "2002-11-23T16:26:27Z")
Of course, of his twelve wives Aisha was the only one under 17. Definitely sounds like someone who would never marry anyone except a child. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/31 "2002-11-23T16:54:45Z")
And, you have things mixed up. His first wife was Khadija. He was 25, and she was 40, I believe, and if he had a “favorite” wife, it would have been her. According to all accounts, they had a great relationship, she was the one who encouraged him that the revelations were true, and he didn’t take a second wife while she was alive. Some things to remember about Ayesha. 1. She was already engaged to someone else when she married Mohammed. Meccans married young. 2. There’s some question about the hadiths that say she was 9, and evidence to say she was, in fact, 12. 3. Muhammed, after marrying her, didn’t have sex with her for two years. 4 This was a political marriage and not a lovematch. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/32 "2002-11-23T16:57:05Z")
BTW, there are other methods of dating that place her as old as 17 or 20. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/33 "2002-11-23T17:07:15Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by apotheosis \* > \*\*Hell yes, it does…9 is **WAY** past a 6-year-old’s bedtime. \*\* Goddamn, I really wish I had written that. ---
**Author:** ![xcheopis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/bc8723/32.png) [@xcheopis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xcheopis)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/34 "2002-11-23T17:31:23Z")
According to **Karen Armstrong** , in her book _Muhammad:A biography of the Prophet_: > [@](#): > > “Finally, about a month after [she] had arrived in Mecca, it was decided that it was time for the wedding of Muhammad with Aisha. She was still only nine years old, so there was no wedding feast and the ceremonial was kept to a minimum. …The marriage made little difference to Aisha’s life. Tabari says that she was so young that she stayed in her parents’ home and the marriage was consummated there later **when she had reached puberty.** ” (bolding mine) Puberty was the normal age at which girls were married off, so Aisha was not unusually young when the marriage was consummated. ---
**Author:** ![irishgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8edcca/32.png) [@irishgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/irishgirl)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2002, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217/35 "2002-11-24T15:30:58Z")
thinks to myself… in rape trials, in the west, isn’t asking what the victim was wearing still an acceptable question? mooches off… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islam-and-sexual-self-control/138217.md?page=1)