New Documentary Spotlights a Remarkable Woman Imam

As a young Muslim girl growing up in Berlin in the ‘70s, Seyran Ateş decided at an early age that she wanted to challenge the patriarchy within Islam and society in general. She noticed the difference in the way she and her brothers were treated, and how they were allowed to go out and play while she needed to stay at home.

Ateş didn’t reject Islam — rather she decided to work to change it from within, and now she’s a lawyer and the imam of the Ibn Rushd-Goethe mosque in Berlin, which she established in 2017. Due to numerous death threats (she’s been shot and been the target of two fatwas), Ateş has constant police protection.

A new documentary, Seyran Ateş: Sex, Revolution and Islam, shows Ateş’ work at the mosque, where women and men worship together, there’s an LGBTQ youth group, and Ateş encourages discussion and debate. It also tells some of Ateş’ personal stories — the movie opens with her reading some of the emails she has received containing death and rape threats, and she talks about being shot in the neck and shoulder when she was a counselor at a women’s shelter. We see her police escorts. The film also tells the story of her nephew, who started getting radicalized online but with Ateş’ help came out as gay and became active in the mosque. We accompany Ateş as she travels around the world working for human rights, going to Madrid, for example, for the anniversary of the 2004 bombings at 10 train stations that killed 193 people, and visiting traditional female imams in China, who are shocked that in the Berlin mosque, women often go without head coverings.

After the September 11 attacks in the U.S., Oslo-based Turkish Norwegian filmmaker Nefise Özkal Lorentzen, who sees herself as doing “gender activism through films,” thought about leaving her faith, feeling it no longer had room for her. But her gay Muslim friends felt differently. Lorentzen wanted to try and understand how they felt about Islam, and she made a trio of controversial films to explore how being a feminist and gay could fit with being a Muslim, as well as one about the patriarchy: Gender Me, A Balloon for Allah, and ManIslam.

Lorentzen then planned to make a film about female imams. Her mother sent her an article about Ateş, telling Lorentzen she needed to talk to her if she wanted to make a good film. The filmmaker went to Berlin to meet Ateş. She was struck by the singularity of Ateş’ vision, her determination, and how she stood out from other leaders. She decided to make a film focused on Ateş.

Lorentzen says she felt a connection to Ateş almost immediately. Ateş experienced that as well, saying it feels as though they’ve known each other forever. Ateş said she and the filmmaker believe in working for social change — but they want to have fun too. She says she’s glad she chose Lorentzen to make this film.

“More than 40 people wanted to do a documentary about this new mosque and our visions and ideas and what we’re doing and what is contemporary Islam,” Ateş said on a video call from Berlin with Lorentzen in Oslo. “We had a lot of media interest worldwide, but when Nefise wrote me and sent me links to her movies, I realized, ‘Oh, she’s great. Maybe she can understand our vision and our dreams, and maybe she can feel the spirituality,’ and it worked. It was like she’s an old friend of mine, and I’ve known her for centuries.”

Ateş was born in 1963 in Turkey, and her family moved to Berlin when she was 6 years old. Like many children of immigrants, she translated for her relatives. She says that while doing this she saw how they were treated as lesser by people at institutions, such as schools, the police station, and hospitals. That’s why she decided to become a lawyer to fight for people like her relatives, leaving home at 17 to go to law school.

“I was able to defend my parents, my aunts, my uncles, so I was a defender,” she said. “So, I started thinking about defending the minorities and people who can’t stand up for themselves. At the same time, I started reading literature about women’s rights, and it inspired me. It was like a bomb in my heart. I wanted to be like them.”

As with Lorentzen, the events of September 11 inspired Ateş to do something different — she says she felt a responsibility to show that Islam wasn’t about violence and terrorism. That’s when she decided to open her mosque and to make it inclusive. At first, she was looking for a female imam to lead it. But when she started studying more, she says she realized the Koran doesn’t have regulations about who can be an imam.

“When I opened the mosque and had a congregation that accepts me as an imam, I am an imam,” she said. “Look to the history of the religion or to Israel or to Rome, and it’s the same — men always telling the story, and men are on top and women are behind them. Just follow the man. Why? I can walk myself, and I have good orientation, so why do I have to follow them? Why don’t they follow me? Then I became a woman like my idols, and I started the mosque.”

Ateş says the congregation is growing and lots of young people are involved. She likes to see herself as part of a team rather than the person telling everyone what to do — something that struck Lorentzen when she first showed up at the mosque. She says that rather than having people serve her, Ateş was getting cups of tea for people, and when Lorentzen tried to film the imam, she had difficulty since she was busy moving a table. This willingness to get involved and not set herself apart made a deep impression on Lorentzen.

“I have seen Seyran’s leadership, and I thought that is the leadership we need in our religion. The patriarchal way is the leaders are leading and the people are receiving. What I’ve seen with Seyran is she is serving her community,” Lorentzen said. “For me as a feminist artist, my revolution starts with observation and changing behaviors.”

Another way Ateş’ leadership is different, captured in the documentary, is that she holds listening circles at the mosque, encouraging discussion and debate. Ateş said she doesn’t want people to think they have to accept everything the imam says. She said that just that day members of the mosque had discussed the question of whether religion helps make you free.

“Why is a man is standing in front of the congregation saying he has the truth in his hand, and everyone has to accept that?” she asked. “Many, many people coming to our mosque say this is what touched them, and that this is the first time they were allowed to ask questions.”

When asked how she takes on patriarchy, Ateş says the answer lies in action, and that’s why she opened a mosque where men and women pray together.

“I give the answer through my behavior. To act is very important to me,” she said. “I’m praying and here’s the mosque and we are together, and to act is the answer to break the patriarchy and show it’s possible.”