# Sa'diyya Shaikh

Sa'diyya Shaikh (born 1969) is a South African scholar of Islam and feminist theory. She is a professor of religion at the University of Cape Town. She studies Sufism in relation to feminism and feminist theory. She is known for work on gender in Islam and 'Ibn Arabi.

## Quotes

* While ontology deals with existence in general, its intimate companion, cosmology, provides a map for understanding the universe in its totality—its origin, purpose, and destiny, including the human being’s place within it. Cosmology concerns an understanding of the order and relationships between the various parts of the created universe. Questions that arise in relation to cosmology might include the following: What is the nature of the universe? How was it created? For what purpose and toward what des-tiny was it created? What are a human being’s origin, place, and purpose in this universe? Thus, a cosmological level of inquiry in Islam enables the inquirer to situate notions of human nature and existence within a broader framework of understanding the nature of all creation. In a study of Islamic cosmology, one also finds macrocosmic mappings of gender that resonate in varying ways with understandings of human genderedness.
* Litating the coming into existence of creation. Comprising the vital con-duit for humankind’s existence in relation to the essence, the divine names simultaneously veil us from It. The divine essence is at once a profound and unknowable mystery and that from which all else derives its being. It is en-tirely transcendent, yet nothing in creation is separate from its qualities. It is the pervasive center in which all contradictions are transcended.
* Hardly have the words left his lips when a hand softer than silk touches his shoulder. He turns. A young woman of breathtaking beauty gazes intently at him. As if omniscient, she responds to his poetic rumination with a depth of spiritual discernment, subjecting each line of his poem to careful scrutiny, culminating in a reprimand: How can “the great mystic of the time” pos-sibly question God’s knowledge of his state? A true lover is content with the desires of the Beloved even when they entail absence and separation.
* I came of age during apartheid in the 80s in a Muslim community in a society that was deeply segregated, and so all of those kinds of influences were deeply impacted me quite deeply.
* I grew up in a Muslim community, particularly with parents and a father that used to tell me the most extraordinary stories and which inspired me. So, I grew up on stories of Shaykh Abdulkad Jaylani Sheikh Rabia, and those were not stories that was told to me as if they were Sufi stories; they were told to me as stories of what good Muslims were, and so my imagination and my heart was fired up.
* As a child, I used to relish these greatly, and it was the part of Islam that resonated for me; they were pretty much for me. These people that my father used to tell me stories about struck me a little bit like superheroes; they were my spiritual superheroes, and I was very inspired by them. So that was quite influential in my life and in my formation.
* My relationship to religion became a little bit more fraught. So, that initial relationship to religion was all about these beautiful characters who had incredible virtue and valour and courage and spiritual refinement and beautiful adap. That was formative for me thinking about in living Islam and the things that inspired me and the things that were shown up to me as a mirror of goodness.
* A lot of my engagements with religion emerged out of those kinds of formative experiences: a deep kind of immersion and a desire and a yearning for the kinds of spiritual treasures that were part of the stories of my childhood, and then wrestling with injustice and thinking about human dignity, human equality, and justice as being central to thinking about a relationship with God.
* I map how Sufism resides at the heart of Muslim spirituality and has fundamental implications for thinking about gender in terms of law, virtue and ethics.
** Shaikh describes the book 'Sufi Narratives of Intimacy: Ibn 'Arabi, Gender, and Sexuality' as reflecting a feminist voice within Islam. 2015
* My book is about reading critically and constructively against the grain, and claiming a particular space within the Muslim tradition to talk back to patriarchy. It is about claiming an authority within the tradition not for me, but for a certain voice of radical human equality which resides within the tradition.
** About her award-winning book. 2015
* I was sitting with another graduate student reading (Ibn 'Arabi) texts in Arabic and English, and it was one of those moments that time seemed to have condensed: the sun had set, hours had passed and the two of us didn't notice the entire world go by. It was a moment of genuine, absolute awe. I came out of it marvelling at the vastness and possibilities of being human. The questions of what it means to be human within the Muslim tradition, and how gender influences one's understandings of a person's humanity remained with me.
** Describing her first encounter with the writings of Ibn 'Arabi whilst participating in a graduate course on Sufism during her time as a Fulbright scholar in America. 2015
* Sufism is about embodying virtue. That virtue should extend from within oneself to society, an integral part of the spiritual life. Importantly justice is one of the central virtues in this tradition. The challenge to contemporary Muslims is to formulate dynamic and relevant understandings of justice for our times.
** Explains what Sufism is all about. 2015
* Feminism gives me a language with which I can speak to my comrades and sisters in other (religious) traditions or those in no traditions who are struggling with injustice because as human beings we share, confront and resist these realities collectively and as part of diverse communities of belonging.
** Religion is not the only vehicle for transforming oneself and society. 2015
* For justice to ripen into a truly transformative and sustaining force, it must draw back from that deep current of love, and this is where we dive into for respite, rest, rejuvenation, replenishment, and creativity.
** Islamic Feminist Imaginaries: Love, Beauty, and Justice. 2021