A Bahraini woman disguised as a male cleric tried to deliver a sermon during prayers last week, leading to a scuffle with worshippers and her subsequent arrest, the mosque imam said on Monday.
The woman, bearded and bespectacled, made her way to the stand where Sheikh Adnan al-Qatan was about to give a sermon during Friday’s weekly prayers ”when the muezzin grabbed hold of ‘him’ to ask where he was going,” said Qatan.
”When I noticed what was going on below the stand, I started my sermon so as not to cause a scene. The ‘man’ was taken to a room in the mosque,” Qatan said, adding that at one point she was able to overpower four men trying to restrain her.
”The muezzin then noticed that the voice of the man had changed and become softer and that the beard was suddenly lopsided before they discovered the sheikh was a woman,” he added.
When asked her motive, ”the woman, yelling and screaming, said she had wanted to deliver a sermon because she wants to prevent sedition,” Qatan said, without providing more details. She was arrested.
Police had no comment when contacted by AFP.
”I didn’t feel angry,” Qatan said.
”I felt that this person was not mentally stable because of what she did.”
Male and female Muslims are segregated during prayers in mosques where places are allocated for women to worship and follow the sermon through loudspeakers.
Traditionally, mosques in Bahrain were not built to segregate the sexes but since the 1980s, a lot of mosques accommodate both in separate areas. – Sapa-AFP