Encyclopedia of Islam

Further reading: Hugh Kennedy, The Prophet and the 

Age of the Caliphates (London: Longman, 1985); Wil-

ferd Madelung, The Succession to Muhammad: A Study of 

the Early Caliphate (Cambridge: Cambridge University 

Press, 1997).

Uzbekistan

  See c

entral

 a

sia

 

and

 

the

 

c

aucasus

.

Uzza, al-

  See 

goddess

.

Uzza, al-

  

701  J

---

702

AF

J:

veil

Veil is the most common English translation 

of the Arabic word 

hijab

 (a word whose many 

meanings also include “cover” or “screen”), most 

frequently understood as the head scarf worn by 

some Muslim 

Women

. The matter of the veil is a 

highly contentious and controversial one. There 

is much historical evidence indicating that the 

practice of veiling is not peculiar to i

slam

, and 

nothing in the q

Uran

 explicitly or unequivocally 

requires it of women. Muslim proponents of the 

hijab often refer to Quranic verses 24:30–31, 

which direct both Muslim men and women to 

dress and interact modestly, and also instruct 

women not to display their beauty except to their 

husbands and close relatives. The word hijab

does not appear here; rather the reference is to 

the draping of khumur—a type of covering over 

the hair worn by some women in seventh-cen-

tury Arabia—over the chest. Nor does the word 

appear in verse 33:59, which instructs women to 

cover their persons using jalabib (loose cloaks). 

During the time of the prophet m

Uhammad

 (d. 

632) only the women of his own family, who 

were held to unique standards of modesty, veiled 

themselves. Muslims continue to debate today 

both the issue of whether the Quran prescribes 

a specific type of covering of women’s bodies or 

rather modest clothes for women in general as 

well as the stringency of that prescription.

Colonial discourses in the Euro-American and 

Muslim worlds have played a significant role in 

constructing images and perceptions about the 

veil. The history of Western colonization in Mus-

lim countries recounts European manipulation 

of the veil as a symbol of Islam’s backward and 

barbaric nature and as evidence of the necessity for 

occupying and civilizing Muslim societies. In turn, 

Muslim resistance to 

colonialism

 has often recon-

figured the veil as a symbol of its religio-national 

essence. Some assumptions about the veil within 

Euro-American feminist discourse have also tended 

to oversimplify its meanings for Muslim women. In 

all cases, debates on the veil have tended to ignore 

the agency of Muslim women and the rich, varied 

expressions of their veiling, which, to name only a 

few, may include statements about a woman’s class 

standing, her religious or national identification, or 

even her resistance to Western modes of sexuality.

See also 

bUrqa

; 

pUrdah

.

Aysha A. Hidayatullah