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222chapter five2.emancipation. MuÈammad’s (ß) reforms were only one small (albeitnot insignificant) part of a much wider scheme of women’sliberation.Exegetes have failed to correctly identify the meaning of the Arabicterm al-nis§", which has often been too narrowly understood tomean ‘women’. The importance of redefining this term is immediatelyapparent when we look at the following two verses:Fair in the eyes of men [sic] [li’l-n§s] is the love of things they covet:women [sic][ al-nis§"] 5 and sons; heaped-up hoards of gold and silver;horses branded (for blood and excellence); and (wealth of )cattle and well-tilled land. Such are the possessions of this world’slife, but in nearness to God is the best of the goals (to return to).($l #Imr§n 3:14)Your wives [sic][nis§"ukum] 6 are as a tilth unto you. So approachyour tilth when or how you will, but do some good act for yoursouls beforehand; and fear God. And know that you are to meetHim (in the Hereafter), and give (these) good tidings to those whobelieve. ( Al-Baqara 2:223)If we still insist, as generations of exegetes did, 7 that al-nis§" canonly mean ‘women’ or ‘wives’ we have entered, hermeneuticallyand intellectually, a cul-de-sac that cuts us off from a progressive5Like YA other translators render the Arabic al-n§s and al-nis§" as referring tomen ( al-n§s) and women ( al-nis§"), even though al-n§s is gender neutral and includesmen and women, AH: ‘the love of desirable things is made alluring for men—women,children…’; AA: ‘Decked out fair to men is the love of lusts—women, children…’.Other translators render al-n§s in a more generic sense as ‘mankind’ (although stillgendered—it should be humankind!) or ‘people’, but still translate al-nis§" as‘women’; AB: ‘To mankind the love of worldly appetites is painted in glowing colours:women and children’; MF: ‘attractive to mankind is made the pleasures of women’; AhA:‘Enamoured are the people of the lust of (earthly) pleasures, of women and of children’;MP: ‘Beautified for mankind is love of the joys (that come) from women and offspring’.This rendition of [gender biased] mankind (loves) women is for MS still not satisfactorysince it: a) allows us to regard women as a commodity, not more than ‘heaped-uphoards of gold and silver, and b) it is theologically inconsistent since mankind’s (atleast generically comprising both men and women) love of women sanctions women’slove of women and this is not explicitly sanctioned by the Book.6Like YA, AH renders al-nis§" straightforwardly as ‘wives’, implying that theverse addresses the (sexual) relationship of a (heterosexual) marriage, ‘your wives areyour fields’. The others keep al-nis§" generically as ‘women’, MF, AA: ‘your womenare a tillage for you’; AhA: ‘women are like fields for you’; MP: ‘your women are atilth for you’; AB: ‘your women are fertile fields for you’, but both renderings are forMS still inherently misogynist in the way they project women as objects or commoditiesfor sating men’s lust.7The translators of the Qur"an are no exception to this, as we can see in theexamples given in the two previous footnotes.