[In the following review, Halsell praises Mernissi's examination of the lives and reigns of numerous Islamic women governors, sultanas, and rulers from 1000-1800 A.D. in The Forgotten Queens of Islam, and notes Mernissi's distinction between “political Islamic history” and what she terms Risala Islam—or the true Islam of the Quran.]

When Benazir Bhutto first became prime minister of Pakistan after winning the elections of 1988, all who monopolized the right to speak in the name of Islam raised the cry of blasphemy. Invoking Islamic tradition, they decried this event as “against nature.” Political decision-making among their ancestors, they said, was always a men's affair. Those who claimed to speak for Islam alleged that no woman had ever governed a Muslim state between 622 and 1988, and thus, Benazir Bhutto could not aspire to do so either.

In The Forgotten Queens of Islam, Fatima Mernissi proves that these defenders of Islamic tradition were not only misguided, but wrong. In her absorbing exploration of Islamic history, Mernissi documents the lives and reigns of 16 women who ruled from 1000 A.D. to 1800 as governors, sultanas and queens throughout the Islamic world. Some received the reins of power by inheritance; others had to kill the heirs in order to take power. Many themselves led battles, inflicted defeats, concluded armistices. Some had confidence in competent viziers, while others counted only on themselves. “Each had her own way of treating people, of rendering justice and of administering taxes.” Coins were minted in their names, and the khutba or Friday sermon was proclaimed in their names in the mosques.

Yet their lives and stories, achievements and failures have largely been forgotten. Why have they mysteriously fallen out of recent Islamic history books? Mernissi blames “political Islam,” which she carefully distinguishes from what she calls Risala Islam—the true Islam of the Quran and the Prophet's traditions. In a time and era when brute force often reigned supreme, Muhammad gave new lessons about slaves, non-violence and women. It was not the Prophet who said women should cover their faces or shun politics. Mernissi reminds us that Muhammad revolutionized life for women—granting them the right to divorce, the right to inherit, the right to have custody of their children in the event of divorce, the right to pray in the mosque and the right to participate as fully in life as men.

Born in 1941 in Fez, Mernissi is regarded by many as one of the preeminent Quranic scholars of our time. She was educated entirely in Quranic schools and spoke only Arabic until she was 20. After earning a degree in political science at University Mohammed V, she won a scholarship to the Sorbonne and later received a doctoral degree in sociology from Brandeis University.

While all 16 women whose lives she documents were powerful, two Arab women who ruled Yemen, Malika Asma and Malika Arwa, seem especially worthy to note. Asma claimed the attention of the historians not only because she held power, but also because she attended councils with her “face uncovered” (unveiled). Mernissi quotes a modern Yemeni historian: “She was one of the most famous women of her time and one of the most powerful. She was munificent. She was a poetess who composed verses. Among the praises given her husband, Al-Sulayhi, by the poets was the fact that he had her for a wife. … When he ascertained the perfection of her character, her husband entrusted the management of state business to her. He rarely made decisions that went against her advice.”

A second Yemeni queen, Arwa, was the daughter-in-law of Asma. She held power for almost half a century (from 485/1091 to her death in 532/1138). The two queens held the same royal title, al-sayyida al-hurra: “The noble lady who is free and independent; the woman sovereign who bows to no superior authority.”

If Mernissi could easily find these Muslims women rulers, why do so many modern “scholars” fail to do so? Mernissi quotes Bernard Lewis as having written: “There are no queens in Islamic history.” Such untrue statements, she adds, mean that Muslim women cannot rely on male researchers such as Lewis to read their history for them. Rather, Muslim women must read it for themselves.

While Muslim women have become heads of state, no woman has become caliph. Two of the criteria of eligibility for the caliphate are being a male and being an Arab, though the second rule could be and later was bent. As for women being barred, she asks:

“How to reconcile these two points: the principle of equality among all believers and the very restrictive criteria of the caliphate?” Again, she blames “political Islam,” writing that “the Islam of the politicians changes its colors according to the circumstances. The politicians who are caliphs and qadis can at will bend Islam risala, the Islam of the Prophet's message in the holy book, the Quran, to suit the precise interests they wish to defend.”

A foray into the past, she writes, brings with it one absolute certitude: to return there is impossible, because of what has changed in the world, including Muslim societies. “The heaven of the Abbasid caliphs is no longer our heaven, their earth is no longer ours.”

Mernissi has written five previous books on Islam, all noted for their original and scrupulous research. Her most widely-read books include: Beyond the Veil: Male-Female Dynamics in Modern Muslim Society and The Veil and the Male Elite: A Feminist Interpretation of Women's Rights in Islam.

In The Forgotten Queens, she writes that universal suffrage “tears away two veils” that give substance to political Islam: “the hijab (veil) of women and the hijab or veil of the caliph.” When these “veils” of political Islam are removed, she says, one arrives at the “will of the people.”

“In today's Muslim world, there is no longer any debate about the legitimacy of universal suffrage.” Rather, she says, “Nowadays, it is about the degree of falsification of election results. This is a big step forward toward the acceptance of the people as the source of sovereignty. And yet there is nothing more foreign to political power in Islam than the recognition that sovereignty resides in the people—a bizarre idea that would never have crossed the mind of the most pious caliph.”

While most male authorities traditionally do not object to women acquiring education—this, after all, can be used to a man's benefit—they have too often objected to women developing a “will” of their own. Yet the ability of human beings to develop their minds depends on the degree of responsibility they take for what happens on their earth. “If the earth belongs to someone else, the need to think becomes superfluous.”

The “caliphal earth” of the believers is low, physical and heavy with sensuality, Mernissi writes. She believes each Muslim should establish his or her own Islam, based on the Prophet's message. In her inspiring book, she gives a glimpse of how one might escape a narrow dogma of a political creed and rise on wings “to the overwhelming majesty of heaven,” to “the immensity of divine eternity.”