centerforsecuritypolicy | The tragic story of hundreds of young girls captured by the Islamic terror group and Nigerian insurgency Boko Haram has caught much national attention,
along with a twitter campaign Hashtag #BringOurWomenBack. But not much
attention has been paid to Boko Haram’s stated ideology. In a ForeignPolicy.com column
subtitled, “Why women are the ‘spoils of war’ in Nigeria and around the
world — and nobody cares,” writer Lauren Wolfe generalizes, “Girls are
the low-hanging fruit of the biblically proportioned anger at Eve.”
Yet even while sermonizing regarding the lack of seriousness with
which the world deals with sexual slavery and violence against women,
Wolfe fails to give the situation the seriousness it deserves by
examining why Boko Haram does what it does, the Sharia, Islamic law.
Wolfe points out that Boko Haram means “Western Education is
Forbidden”, without ever enlightening Foreign Policy’s readers that they
mean “forbidden by Islamic law”. And despite claims by organizations
like The Islamic Society of North America, and Egypt’s Al Azhar university,
there’s ample evidence to suggest that Boko Haram’s understanding of
what is and is not forbidden under Islamic law is accurate.
In ‘The Reliance of the Traveller: A Classic Manual of Islamic Sacred Law’
by Ahmad ibn Naqib al-Misri (d. 1368) and published in English
translation by Nuh Ha Mim Keller in 1994 under the section, “The Rules
of Warfare”:
“O.913 When a child or a woman is taken captive, they become slaves
by the fact of capture, and the woman’s previous marriage is immediately
annulled.”
The implication of the marriage annulment is that the women are now available as sexual slaves or wives.
Not that ISNA and Al-Azhar should be surprised by this. The ISNA-affiliated Fiqh Council of North America approved Reliance with
then President Taha Jabir al ‘Alwani calling it an “eminent work of
Islamic jurisprudence.” The Al-Azhar Islamic Research Academy certified
that the manual, “conforms to the practice and faith of the orthodox
Sunni school (ahl al-Sunna wa al-Jama’a).”
Nor is Reliance’s interpretation alone in understanding Islamic
law to permit sexual slavery. As Ibn Kathir (d.1373) in his highly
regarded Tafsir (exegeses) of the Koran, explains, the source of this
understanding is Quran Sura 4:25:
“Also (forbidden are) women already married, except those whom
your right hands possess.) The Ayah means, you are prohibited from
marrying women who are already married, (except those whom your right
hands possess) except those whom you acquire through war, for you are
allowed such women after making sure they are not pregnant.”
So to sadly, to answer Wolfe’s question, “Why are women spoils of war in Nigeria?”
Because Shariah law requires it.
