Through this analysis, I argue that although progressive scholars have presented strong new interpretations and translations of concepts like men’s authority in marriage (‘qawwamuna’), women’s rebellion against that authority (‘nushuz’) and practicing wife-beating (‘idribuhunna’) that challenge traditional understandings of the marital relationship, they do not fully succeed in denouncing the Qur’anic permission for wife-beating. In this dissertation, I firstly analyse the approaches of progressive and reformist scholars toward the controversial Qur’anic verse 4:34 and secondly, assess the ways these approaches impact British Muslims’ daily lives.
