ABSTRACT
The exclusion of women from the power structures of institutionalized Islam, along with the specific religious requirements for women, has jointly brought about specific female-oriented ramifications. Islam is a "simple" religion, says popular phrase in Islamist circles, and it is not in need of the intellectual discussions. The challenges to Islam and the directions it could take are apparent, especially when the issues are taken out of the newspaper headlines and placed within the lives of individuals. The concept of seclusion has produced a great deal of debate in Islam, with some people stating that seclusion is not a part of the religion, and others saying that it is. Seclusion of women has become the most firmly lodged image of Islamic society in the Western popular imagination. Many of the Modernist voices that are being heard coming from within, rather than from outside, the Muslim contexts have at least one common element among them: they speak from an intellectual context.
