Al-Ghazali’s Interpretation of Muslim Men and Menstruation in the 11th Century

Abstract

The paper focuses on medieval menstruation in the Islamic religion. The primary source is Marriage and Sexuality in Islam: a Translation of al-Ghazali’s Book on the Etiquette of Marriage from the Ihya by Madelain Farah, who translated and edited al-Ghazali’s work to English. The paper explores other scholarly work on menstruation in the medieval time period or in various religions. Ultimately, the paper discovered that al-Ghazali’s writing on menstruation was a male oriented view, based in the 11th century, and was therefore very strict. al-Ghazali's views did not follow all of Muhammad’s original views on women, prayer, and menstruation.