182 Women and the Transmission of Religious Knowledge in Islam life) and undertook pilgrimage to Jerusalem and a third Hajj. She then settled in Mecca and died there. Fatima’s choice to withdraw from the world, while not necessarily signaling religious learning, nonetheless highlights yet another avenue of pietistic engagement available to women of the late Mamluk and early Ottoman eras. The unusual cases of ‘A’isha bint Yusuf al-Ba‘uniyya (d. 922/1516) and Fatima bint ‘Abd al-Qadir (a.k.a. Bint al-Qarimzan, d. 966/1558) reveal additional prospects for women’s religious education. ‘A’isha al-Ba‘uniyya ranks as one of the most prodigious women of late classical Islam. Born in Damascus in the mid-ninth/fifteenth century, ‘A’isha belonged to a wellestablished ‘ulama’ family that had produced generations of preachers, jurists, Qur’an scholars, and literary figures. Ibn al-Tmad introduces her in superlative terms, highlighting her uniqueness as a literary figure, scholar, poet, and one who exhibited exemplary piety and virtue. In addition to acquiring the requisite training in Qur’an and hadith, to which she would have been entitled in accordance with her lineage, ‘A’isha surpassed her peers by being granted ijdzas for issuing legal edicts and teaching law ( ujizat bi’l-iftd' iva’l-tadns) and by composing numerous works of poetry and prose, most of them infused with Sufi themes such as longing for the Prophet, praise for Sufi masters, and mastering the practice of ascetic piety. 1 ' While her intellectual genealogy is similar to that of Zaynab bint alKamal and ‘A’isha bint Muhammad b.‘Abd al-FIadl, she was more accomplished and attained a superlative reputation as a Sufi writer and poetess. A study of her life suggests that she was elaborating and building on the legacies of prior generations of female religious scholars. The second woman, Fatima bint ‘Abd al-Qadir b. Muhammad, was a Hanafl shaykba who, though less accomplished than ‘A’isha al-Ba‘uniyya, attracts attention for attaining the rank of shaykba of two Sufi institutions, the Khanqah al-‘Adiliyya and the Khanqah al-Dajjajiyya. 140 Further 136 She has been the subject of several studies by Th. Emil Homerin. See his “Living Love: The Mystical Writings of ‘A’ishah al-Ba‘uniyah,” Mamluk Studies Review 7 (2003): 211-34; “Writing Sufi Biography: The Case of ‘A’ishah al-Ba‘un!yah (d. 922/1571),” Muslim World 96, no. 3 (2006): 389-99; and Emanations of Grace: Mystical Poems by A ’ishah al-Ba ‘uniyab, ed., trans., and introd. Th. Emil Homerin (Louisville: Fons Vitae, 2011). 137 For an overview, see El2, s.v. “al-Ba‘unI.” 138 Ibn al-Tmad, Sbadbarat al-Dhahab, 10:157. 139 See Homerin, “Living Love,” for a more detailed treatment of ‘A’isha’s mystical writings. 140 Ibn al-‘Imad, Sbadbarat al-Dbabab, 10:506. For an analysis of the role of the kbanqab in the Mamluk period, see Th. Emil Homerin, “Saving Muslim Souls: The Kbanqab and the Sufi Duty in Mamluk Lands,” Mamluk Studies Review 3 (1999): 59-83.