Why didn Inayat Khan use gender-inclusive language?
Inayat Khan was using the formal English of the day, in which it was considered proper to use use “he” as a gender-neutral pronoun, and to use “man” to indicate all of mankind in general. Did Inayat Khan respect women? Inayat Khan held women in the highest esteem. Most of his students were women, and of those students to whom he granted the highest level of initiation, all of them were women. In his personal notebooks, Inayat Khan wrote lines such as the following: In man We have designed Our image; In woman We have finished it. Woman, whom destiny has made to be man’s superior, by trying to become his equal, falls beneath his estimation. Through the loving heart of woman manifests Thy divine grace. Were Inayat Khan’s lectures aimed primarily at men? Most of Inayat Khan’s students were women, so if his presentation was biased toward any specific gender, it would have been in favor of the women in his audience. How could he use “he” to refer to women? That was the proper formal usage of
Inayat Khan was using the formal English of the day, in which it was considered proper to use use “he” as a gender-neutral pronoun, and to use “man” to indicate all of mankind in general. Did Inayat Khan respect women? Inayat Khan held women in the highest esteem. Most of his students were women, and of those students to whom he granted the highest level of initiation, all of them were women. In his personal notebooks, Inayat Khan wrote lines such as the following: In man We have designed Our image; In woman We have finished it. Woman, whom destiny has made to be man’s superior, by trying to become his equal, falls beneath his estimation. Through the loving heart of woman manifests Thy divine grace. And in his autobiography he wrote: There is no line of work or study which woman in the West does not undertake and does not accomplish as well as man. Even in social and political activities, in religion, in spiritual ideas, she indeed excels man. The charitable organizations existing in d
