control and sexuality

Control and Sexuality: The Revival of Zina Laws in Muslim ContextsRahbar/Rahbar-e enqelab: ‘Leader of the Revolution’, the term commonly used, both inthe constitution and in everyday political discourse in Iran, for the leading jurist (faqih).Rahbari: Leadership.Raison d’être: The most important reason or purpose for someone or something’sexistence.Rajm/Rejm: Death by stoning.Raqqad/Sleeping foetus: The principle recognised by some schools of fiqh that anembryo may ‘sleep’ in the mother’s womb and be born many months, even years, after thedissolution of her marriage and still be attributed to her former husband; the embryo isbelieved to remain dormant in the mother’s womb until it is awakened, for example by amagical potion or intervention by a saint. This belief is still widespread in North and WestAfrica.Reaya: Tax-paying lower class in the Ottoman Empire.Reformasi movement: Reform movement (Indonesia).Ridda: Apostasy.Roko: Traditional Hausa eulogy or praise-singing, typically performed by musical artisansand bards called maroka (sing. maroki) (Nigeria).RUU Anti Pornografi dan Pornoaksi: Draft Anti Pornography and ‘Pornoaction’ Bill(Indonesia).Salb: Crucifixion.Sarengat: Law (Indonesia)Sariqah: Theft.Satr: ‘Covering’ – in terms of dress; concealing.Şeriat: See Shari’a.Seyhülislam/Shaikh ul-Islam: The highest-ranking religious legal advisor to the Ottomansultan.Shari’a/Shariyah/Şeriat: A term commonly but erroneously used to refer to the body ofreligious ‘laws’ that are said to be derived from Islam. The debate around divine injunctionsand ‘law’ can be clarified by the following definition of shari’a given by Ziba Mir-Hosseini:“Shari‘ah is the totality of God’s will as revealed to the Prophet Muhammad. Fiqh is theprocess of human effort to identify and extract legal rules from the sacred sources ofIslam: the Qur’an and the Sunnah. Thus, the shari‘ah in Muslim belief is sacred, eternal anduniversal, whereas fiqh, consisting of the vast literature produced by Muslim jurists, is likeany other system of jurisprudence: human, mundane, not eternal, and local” (source: www.xvi