Prof. Azizat Amoloye-Adebayo of the Department of Islamic Law at the University of Ilorin on Thursday urged women to muster courage and stand up to the responsibility of being intellectually engaged.
Amoloye-Adebayo made the call while presenting the institution’s 274th Inaugural Lecture, which had the theme “Islamic Law and The Woman’s Agency.”.
“Women have to be self-aware and wake up to the responsibility of agency that will make the application of divine laws responsive to the inclusive objectives of the law.
“The scholarship of Muslim women in Islamic law in particular should be urgently and actively encouraged and can only be meaningful where the women themselves exercise the courage needed in male-dominated areas.
“Nigeria needs to be more responsive to the reality that secularism is an unrealistic mode of state religion, especially as a multi-religious country,” she said.
While setting the tone of the lecture, Amoloye-Adebayo put the three sub-matters contained in the lecture’s title—Islamic Law, the Woman, and Agency—in their appropriate contexts.
She explained that Islamic law literally means a well-trodden path and is technically described as the highway of divine command in Islam, including matters of law.
“Islamic law originates in Shariah textual authorities of the Quran and Sunnah as understood, interpreted, and applied by scholars and jurists as ‘fiqh.’. Therefore, it is for everyone and not only for men,” the professor said.
Amoloye-Adebayo recalled that women are the other half of creation, the opposite of men, and the woman’s “agency” was as indispensable as the man’s “agency.”.
She said men and women were expected to be comrades in the aid of one another, for both material and spiritual success, as the woman has her own mandate of and for existence.
“This mandate is not dependent on that of the man. If this were not to be so, then the woman must succeed or fail on those indices as well,” the lecturer said.
She explained that “agency” refers to a person’s autonomous control over his or her actions, including a sense of what individuals could accomplish.
Amoloye-Adebayo, however, said “agency” was not about feminism or gender, but a person’s autonomous control over his or her actions.
“This is including a sense of what individuals can accomplish themselves and the responsibility or ownership over one’s actions.
“I worry that for a religious law such as Islamic law, officially recognized as state law or a part of it, it continues to command a sense of obligation.
“In any position of authority, the authority-holder must first hold him or herself accountable to the standard to be enforced to others.
“This is in line with the Islamic law textual position that states, ‘Do you enjoin right conduct on the people and forget to practice it yourselves, and yet you study the scripture? Will you not understand?’” she said.
Amoloye-Adebayo then said all hands must be on deck, and men and women could answer to the appellation of being a woman agent.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the inaugural lecture was attended by the institution’s Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Wahab Egbewole, and other top management officials.
(NAN)
