accompaniment, followed by individual women
divulging their personal problems to the muqad-
damabefore the group. A lìlamay also follow.
Furthermore, the women attend the annual four-
day pilgrimage festival, where they observe men’s
spirit possession rituals, which culminate in such
feats as slashing themselves with swords and con-
suming poisonous snakes. On the fourth day, the
women perform a self-designed theatrical ritual,
donning costumes and re-enacting daily events
exemplifying gender conflicts in the relationships
among members. The ritual serves to process these
conflicts. Algerian ≠îsàwìwomen in France have ini-
tiated the weekly performance of dhikrand lìlain
two locations (Andezian 2001).
Moroccan women’s historical participation in
Sufism has received little scholarly attention. When
the early sixteenth-century head of the Jàzùliyya,
al-Ghazwànì, called for reform of urban and rural
religious education and women’s integration into
religious life as measures to remedy the moral dete-
rioration of Moroccan society, the number of edu-
cated Sufi women increased. Several distinguished
themselves as authorities on Sufism including
≠â±isha al-Idrìsiyya. Al-Ghazwànì’s two most im-
portant disciples, al-Hab†ìand al-Tlìdì, maintained
separate women’s zàwiyas, identical to the men’s,
with muqaddamàttrained in jurisprudence. Al-
Hab†ì’s wife, Amìna bint Khajjù, a fully trained
legist, presided over a women’s zàwiya, where she
taught Islamic and Sufi fundamentals (Cornell 1998).
Some eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Mo-
roccan branches of the Tijàniyya appointed muqad-
damàtto lead women’s dhikrs and initiate new
women members. The muqaddama£ajja Khadìja
wrote a treatise on Sufi doctrine (al-£ajja n.d.),
traced her ancestry back to the Prophet, and initi-
ated men into the order (El Adnani 2001). The
Darqàwiyya encouraged women’s participation,
claiming eight muqaddamàtin 1942 (Trimingham
1971), and allowed gender-mixed gatherings (Vikør
1995).
The scholarly studies of three orders holding
spirit possession ceremonies, the £amàdsha (Cra-
panzano 1973), Ra™™àliyya (Naamouni 1995), and
Gnàwa (Welte 1990), discuss women’s participa-
tion tangentially. Women are not included in the
orders’ hierarchies, but actively participate in their
therapeutic spirit possession practices. Their needs
and experience of trance are recognized as differing
from those of men.
As for orders performing dhikr, in and around
the town of Taroudant, Nàßiri, Jillàlìand Darqàwì
women’s groups separately perform dhikrin local
holy figures’ tombs. Nàßirìand Jillàlìwomen choose
north africa 765their group leaders, whereas male leaders appoint
them in the Darqàwiyya (Dwyer 1978).
Based on fieldwork observations, Nàßirìwomen
perform dhikrevery afternoon in the order’s main
zàwiyain Tamegrut. Likewise, in the Khalùfìtomb
complex in Oujda, women hold a dhikrevery
Friday afternoon in one of the two zàwiyas. Until
30 years ago, 30 to 40 Tijànìwomen gathered daily
to perform dhikrin a separate room in the zàwiya
in Tiznit. The age and socioeconomic background
of these women vary broadly, but older women
tend to make up the largest age group.
Fieldwork observations have revealed that women
throughout Morocco actively participate in the
Bùdshìshiyya, a branch of the Qàdiriyya established
in northeastern Morocco in the early twentieth cen-
tury with a developed national and international
recruitment program. Girls and young unmarried
women (aged 14 to 30) from all over the country
participate in the annual one-month summer train-
ing camp at the main zàwiyain Birkan. In Tiznit,
the women’s group consists solely of Ishilhin (Ber-
bers) from a wide range of socioeconomic back-
grounds. About half are unmarried high school
students or graduates who are fluent in Moroccan
and Modern Standard Arabic and attend the
annual Bùdshìshiyya training camp. The other half
are mostly illiterate, middle-aged to elderly women
with very limited knowledge of Arabic. On Sun-
days and Wednesdays, they all gather in the zàwiya
to perform the Arabic dhikrled by the younger
members or the muqaddama, who initiates new
members and links the group to the men’s group
through contact with the local shaykh. Midway
through the dhikr, two young women, trained at
Birkan, give lessons in ™adith and fiqhin Tashilhit,
and the group chants an age-old Tashilhit religious
poem in unison.Bibliography
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