Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject (52 page)

I feel fear of God not simply because of threats of hell and torments of the grave [
e
adha al..
q
a
br
], though these things are also true because Godmentions them in the Quran. But for me the real fear of God stems from two things: from the knowledge that He is all powerfu
[qudratihi] ,
and from the knowledge of the sins that we have committed in our lives and continue to commit without knowing. Imagine God is the Lord of all worlds. And knowing this engenders fear and awe [khashya wa khushii in you. This is different from fear [al.-khauf] that paralyzes you, because it is fear that motivates you to seek His forgiveness and come closer to Him. Because fear that paralyzes you, or makes you feel despondent about His kindness
[ra}pna] ,
is objectionable and reprehensible
[ma .
But fear that propels you toward Him is commendable and praiseworthy
[rna/Jmud .
So one who fears is not someone who cries all the time
but one who refr from doing things that
make
him afr ofpunishment
. . . . So yes, when I hear talk about fear
[kalam can al- khauj] ,
it has an effect on me because it reminds me of the acts of disobedience I have committed unknowingly, given how absorbed I have been in my life with raising my children and working, and makes me want to seek forgiveness for them. You see if I am not reminded, then I forget, and I become accustomed to making these mistakes and sins. Most of us don't sin intentionally, but we do so without knowing. Talk of fear reminds us of this and forces us to change our behaviors

[�arr atina] .
But the greatness of my Lord [
r
ab
bi
] is that He continually forgives us. This causes me to love Him as much as I fear His capacity for greatness.

Umm Amal's answer is remarkable for its delineation of the economy of fear and love undergirding virtuous action. Notably, these emotions are not simply subjective states in this economy, but are linked to action. Umm Amal therefore draws a distinction between fear that results in inaction ( considered reprehensible, madhmum) and fear that compels one to act virtuously ( per- ceived as desirable or praiseworthy, maQ. ). Fear of God in this conception is a cardinal virtue the force of which one must feel subjectively and act on in

accord with its dictates. Umm Amal also draws a distinction between ordinary fear (khauf) and fear with reverence or awe (khashya). Khauf is what you feel, as another mosque participant put it, when you walk alone into a dark un.. known space, but khashya is what you feel when you confront something or someone whom you regard with respect and veneration-in particular, when you confront that aspect of God that Umm Amal calls "His omnipotence" ( qudratihi).34 She goes on to say that it is precisely the qualities that inspire khashya in her that also inspire her to love God. Thus, in Umm Amal's view, love and fear of God are integrally related to her ability to recognize God's greatness: both in His capacity to punish and in His capacity to forgive and sustain His creatures despite their tendency to err.

Umm Amal's response also speaks to the roles fear and love play in the ha.. bituation of both virtues and vices. Note that the concept of vice does not represent the privation of virtue here; rather, vices and virtues are parallel qualities and can cohabit a single disposition simultaneously (notably, unlike Christianity, there is no notion of "original sin" in Islam) . Unlike Hajja Samira in the lesson described earlier, Umm Amal is talking about Muslims who commit acts of disobedience
(mac=a�i )
out of negligence rather than con.. scious intention. Yet even vices committed out of negligence, according to her, if done repeatedly, have the same effect as intentionally committed vices in that once they have acquired the status of habits they can come to corrode the requisite will to obey God.35 This logic assumes that while someone with a pious disposition can err, the repeated practice of erring from God's program results in the sedimentation of this quality in one's character. This accords with the behaviorist philosophy at the core of Aristotle's notion of habitus in that the repeated performance of vices ( as well as virtues) results in the for.. mation of an unvirtuous ( or virtuous) disposition.36 Fear of God is the capac.. ity by which one becomes cognizant of this state and begins to correct it. Thus, repeated invocations of fear, and practices that evoke and express that fear, train one to live piously ( act as a spur to virtuous action) and are also a permanent condition of the pious self
(al..nafs al
..
muttaq ).

34
Isutzu also spells out this difference in his discussion of the terms
khauf
and
khashya
as they occur in the Quran (1966, 195-97). He shows that in most instances when
kha
is used in the Quran, its proper obj ect is God rather than human beings.

'5
This is also the reasoning implicit in the phrase often repeated by the mosque participants:

"mafish �aghira baed al..istimrar wa mafish kabira baed al..is tighfar,"
which means "vices done repeat.. edly and continually acquire the status of grave sins, and a grave sin if repented properly loses its gravity (in the eyes of God)."

'6
See Nederman's discussion of this point in his exegesis of Aristotle's notions of virtue and habitus (1989-90, 91).

fear as a modality of action