For feminist activists like myself who live in states that enforce religious laws, Yüksel Sezgin's Human Rights under State-Enforced Religious Family Laws in Israel, Egypt and India is an important book. It attempts to answer questions that are relevant to the work we do. Criss-crossing the globe to compare and contrast the cases of Israel, Egypt and India, Sezgin asks how did each state modify the religious family law systems that it inherited from the British, and why? How are human rights infringed when states enforce religious laws? What strategies have individuals employed to resist those harms and do those strategies undermine the political objectives of the states? What can we learn from all this?

Sezgin posits that the states under his examination adapted the religious family law systems they inherited in different ways (Chapter 2), and that each did so for different reasons. Upon the declaration of the State in 1948, Israel kept the existing millet system largely intact.Footnote ¹ In Israel, religious courts and clerics enforce religious laws on Israeli citizens according to their religio-ethnic origins. There is no way for Israelis to ‘opt out’ of this arrangement. Sezgin maintains that the Israeli government did this in order to further two simultaneous goals: (i) to homogenise Jews of different ethnic backgrounds, and (ii) to differentiate Jews from non-Jews. In contrast, Egypt modified its millet system. Shortly after the Nasserist revolution in 1952, Egypt abolished religious courts and transferred jurisdiction to one unified court manned by secular judges; but it kept its religious laws in place and, like Israelis, Egyptians cannot ‘opt out’. Egypt did this, according to Sezgin, because the Nasser government had no overriding ideology and was singularly intent on consolidating its authoritarian administrative power. It did not want to change the normative arrangement by which religious laws determined personal status.

In contrast to both Israel and Egypt, India inherited a religious family law system which had already been unified administratively. Upon gaining independence in 1947, Indian leaders declared their unequivocal desire to reform this system and to pass a single civil code applicable to all citizens, irrespective of caste or religion. They wanted to create an integrated, secular national identity. These strategies were modified almost immediately, explains Sezgin, largely as a result of opposition from the Muslim community. Since 1947, the Indian government has passed laws that normatively unify and ‘secularise’ the personal laws of Hindus, Sikhs, Jains and Buddhists, while excluding Muslims, Christians, Parsis and Jews from their purview. The latter groups are governed to this day by communal laws, although individuals may, in accordance with the Special Marriage Act of 1954, ‘opt out’ and marry under a civil contract.

Sezgin states clearly that state enforcement of religious laws results in human rights violations (Chapter 3). He explains that ‘Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, and Christian personal state laws often discriminate against women and deny them equal rights with men in familial affairs such as marriage, divorce, maintenance, inheritance, and custody’ (pp 57–58). In later asides, he notes that, when imposing religious laws, state authorities assume ‘inquisitorial’ powers that violate the rights of individuals to express their religion without state intervention. He adds that the impact of human rights violations is compounded when the state has no clear hierarchy of norms, or when it has no ‘repugnancy’ clause that makes religious laws subject to human rights standards.

In subsequent chapters, Sezgin draws on the empirical studies he undertook in Israel, Egypt and India to describe how each state violates human rights when it enforces religious personal laws. Using the ‘field of human rights as a testing ground’ (p 73), he then examines whether individuals who participate in ‘resistance strategies’ (p 17) – ‘forum shopping’, rule making and hermeneutics – have successfully undermined the original objectives of their governments when they incorporated the millet system (Chapters 4 to 6). This is his main academic interest, and his answer is an unequivocal ‘yes’. In Israel, Sezgin concludes, resistance efforts have undermined the state's dual objectives of ‘homogenisation’ and ‘differentiation’. Jews who wish to marry non-Jews will ‘forum shop’ by marrying outside the country or by proxy. Muslim women join forces with Jewish women in Israel to pass reformative legislation. ‘Hermeneutic communities’ of Jewish women draft contracts intended to restructure Jewish marriage, and they offer alternative readings of Jewish texts that challenge the interpretive integrity of state rabbinic judges.

In Egypt, Sezgin argues, resistance efforts have partially undermined the administrative goals of the state. The state rebuffed attempts by clergy to regain their judicial seats, but it has not been able to deflect challenges to the interpretive authority of Egyptian judges. Egyptians ‘forum shop’ by converting to different religions in order to further their personal goals. Islamic extremists force judges to apply long forgotten hisba rules to annul the marriages of ‘apostates’, thus intimidating secular intellectuals and activists. Egyptian Muslim feminists, like their Israeli Jewish counterparts, draft contracts intended to reform Muslim marriage; and they have successfully lobbied for a law that allows for no-fault divorce in limited circumstances (Law No. 1 of 2000 – the Khul law).

In India, resistance efforts have prevented the government from implementing its overriding secular goals. After the famous Shah Bano case in 1986,Footnote ² the Muslim community rioted and persuaded the government to pass legislation that specifically excluded Muslims from the purview of India's secular maintenance law, the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act, 1986 (MWPRDA). The community has also set up the powerful All Muslim Personal Law Board. This Board has positioned itself as the authentic (albeit conservative) interpreters of Muslim law, establishing an independent network of two dozen shariya courts that draw many Muslims within its scope even though the courts are voluntary arbitration panels (Dar ul-Qazas).

With his faith confirmed in the power of resistance and in the tenacity of religious groups, Sezgin then announces that it is important to support hermeneutic communities (Chapter 7). He proclaims that ‘alternative interpretations of religious norms and narratives can be successfully harnessed to protect and advance individual rights and liberties’ (p 208), and concludes that ‘the most important observation of the present study is that both in majority and minority settings the hermeneutic approach seems to have emerged as the most promising approach (at least in the short and medium term) to reform in pluri-legal personal status systems’ (pp 213–14). This is important, states Sezgin, since it is difficult, if not impossible, to reform religious personal status laws from the ‘top down’. He further warns policy makers against the ‘hollow right’ of exit (as is evident from the Indian example) and applauds the ‘steady revolution’ unfolding by feminist reinterpretations of religious norms. Citing the case of Sierra Leone (p 208), where women call on religious laws to give them rights to inheritance law unavailable under secular law, he even concludes that religious family law systems can be as enabling as they are constraining. Finally, Sezgin cautions against ‘unilaterally and forcibly’ imposing international human rights law upon every society around the world: ‘we have to recognize that each society … will adopt so-called international human rights principles at its own pace and to its own liking’ (p 221).

This is where I part ways with Sezgin. While I agree that hermeneutics is important and can sometimes correct harms caused in the name of religious laws, Sezgin overstates the power of creative re-interpretation to correct human rights violations. In the same way that creative interpretation can liberalise religious texts, it can also restrict them. What is more, conservative and restrictive interpretations of religious texts are compounded when supported by the state. In the words of British sociologist Anthony Giddens, the state is a ‘power container’.Footnote ³

Rather than applaud the hermeneutic turn, Sezgin could have used the same case studies under examination to critique its utility. In Israel, despite hermeneutic advances described by Sezgin and others,Footnote ⁴ an Israeli Jewish woman is still bound to her failed marriage (forever) if her husband does not agree to deliver a religious bill of divorce to her (a get), or if he is physically unable to do so. Although it is a crime under Israeli law,Footnote ⁵ a Muslim man may divorce his wife unilaterally, even through text messaging. Furthermore, as Sezgin himself notes, rabbinic judges in Israel have drawn on creative hermeneutics to make things worse for women by repealing divorces already agreed to, thus keeping women tethered to husbands and rabbinic courts even after they have received the coveted get.

In Egypt, reforms engendered by hermeneutic manoeuvring and recorded by Sezgin have been at best palliative, and appear unstable. As Sezgin explains, Egyptian judges discourage the use of the progressive marriage contracts drafted by the Justice Department, stating that they are contrary to the spirit of Islam; and they have interpreted the khul law that allows for no-fault divorce in ways that have rendered it almost unworkable by requiring women to pay high sums in exchange for divorce. Moreover, in 2012, Egyptian legislators introduced a bill to repeal the khul law and to withdraw from CEDAW,Footnote ⁶ threatening even the ‘modest’ gains of Egyptian women, as Sezgin notes (p 212 fn 2). The creative resurrection of archaic hisba laws in Egypt that mandate the punishment of transgressors of shariya has actually made things worse for ‘apostate’ Egyptians, even endangering their physical security.

In India, inventive Muslim women have managed to convene shariya courts in which both male and female judges sit but, according to one of the women who established those seemingly progressive courts and again as reported by Sezgin, ‘the law they apply … is not substantially different from the Muslim personal law applied by the [all male Muslim] courts’ (p 199).

Hermeneutics are limited at best. Rather than encouraging states to politely wait for religious communities to reform themselves, Sezgin could have encouraged them to vociferously embrace human rights and to refuse to back religious laws, even partially. Without state backing, religious personal status rules still cause harm, but it is a harm that is essentially self-imposed, as is demonstrated by the position of Jewish women and divorce in the United States. Without state backing, archaic rules such as mamzer Footnote ⁷ and hisba lose their punch, as do rules that prevent women from ending their failed marriages, suing for alimony, obtaining their fair share of marital property, or inheriting. What is more, if states take a clear stand, refusing to defer to religious rules even partially, hermeneutic communities might be more, not less, inclined to fall into line.

It seems to me that Sezgin's case studies could also be used to support the claim that the clearer a state is about its commitment to human rights, the more likely it is that hermeneutic reform may occur. The case of India is proof in fact: although India's commitment to secular personal status is flawed and partial, it is better than that of Israel or Egypt. India has at least made its secular priorities and values clear, and it seems to be making slow but steady headway with minority communities still governed by religious laws. Sezgin notes that, during the 1990s, Parsi and Christian communities adapted legislation that made them more gender equitable, in line with the majority Hindi community. Furthermore, while the Indian legislature suffered a significant setback with the passing of MWPRDA in 1986, Sezgin describes how the judiciary is pushing back, ‘emerg[ing] as champions of progressive judicial activism’ (p 189).Footnote ⁸ The case of India also underscores the need for democratic states to hold their secular ground and to keep their priorities as straight as possible. Sezgin himself seems to imply that had India not made exceptions for minority communities, and had it not put the burden on minority women to ‘opt out’ of their communal laws, the state may have avoided the tumultuous power struggle that it is now having with the Muslim community.

In short, the case studies examined by Sezgin corroborate the proposition that patriarchal religious personal laws harm women and that women cannot rely on religious communities to correct those harms. If the state enforces discriminatory religious rules, citizens have nowhere to turn for relief. As Arjun Appadurai, the social-cultural anthropologist suggests, only the state can provide the ‘mechanism [which] will assure the protection of minorities, the minimal distribution of democratic rights, and the reasonable possibility of the growth of civil society’.Footnote ⁹ To the extent that the state has abandoned those mechanisms or made exceptions to them, the state has neglected its responsibilities to its citizens.

Feminist scholar and sociologist, Valentine Moghadam, similarly summed up the matter when asked to respond to the question of whether Islamic feminism can engender necessary reform in Iran. She wrote:Footnote ¹⁰

I think Sezgin would agree with me. He warns against ‘overreliance upon hermeneutic approaches’ and the possibility of ‘inadvertently reinforcing the notion that people's lives must be solely governed by religious precepts’ (p 218). However, he seems to want to garner transgovernmental support for hermeneutic communities that lobby for change through reinterpretation, translating human rights into the vernacular.Footnote ¹¹ This is a fine interim goal, but one which must be sought after with eyes wide open and directed clearly to the target – the complete disentanglement of states from religious personal laws.

In conclusion, I believe Sezgin's work makes an important contribution to the growing dialogue on the best way to reform the inequities created by the imposition of religious norms in state legal systems. His book coherently and systematically contextualises the developments in three countries which continue to grapple with this challenge, and he gives the lay reader and scholarly community important information and comparative analysis of those efforts. The conclusion he draws from his data opens an important additional chapter in the growing debate between multicultural optimists who believe that cultures will hopefully and eventually correct themselves, and those of us uncompromising liberal humanists who do not want to wait until that happens, and who have no way of knowing how long that wait will be or how many victims it will leave in its wake.