Defending Women’s Right to Leadership in Islam: The Reconstruction of Mainstream Gender-Biased Qur’anic Exegesis of Leadership Verse

Abstract

Up to the present day, women still faced several rejection to hold leadership position in Islamic community. The rejection of women’s leadership stems from interpretations of Qur’anic verse Q.S. Al-Nisā’ (4): 34. Through this verse, majority of exegets came to conclude that women has no right of leadership upon men. This study aimed to reconstruct the scholarly interpretations of Q.S. Al-Nisā’ (4): 34 using qira’ah mubadalah and ma’na-cum-maghza approaches. This study employed a literature review method with prominent exegesis books as its primary sources. The findings of this study revealed that: (1) leadership in Islam is a shared responsibility between men and women; and (2) the rejection or prohibition of women’s leadership is inconsistent with the meaning of Q.S. Al-Nisā’ (4): 34, which in fact encourages all individuals, regardless of gender, to take protective and responsible roles as long as they have the capacity.