Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam presents the first systematic analysis of how these jurists conceptualized marriage-its rights and obligations-using the same rhetoric of ownership used to describe slavery. Kecia Ali explores parallels between marriage and concubinage that legitimized sex and legitimated offspring using eighth- through tenth-century legal texts. As the jurists discussed claims spouses could make on each other-including dower, sex, obedience, and companionship-they returned repeatedly to issues of legal status: wife and concubine, slave and free, male and female.
Complementing the growing body of scholarship on Islamic marital and family law, Ali boldly contributes to the ongoing debates over feminism, sexuality, and reform in Islam.
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