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Introduction:
In his farewell sermon, prophet (saw) talked about many different aspects and among them he mentioned the ways of jahiliya. The ways of jahiliya included many practices; among them were acts of bid’ah, oppressing the poor and oppressing women. Thus this lecture is going to be about oppression of women.
There was only a short period in human history when women were not oppressed. Before that period they were oppressed and even until today they are oppressed; and they cannot escape certain ideas and ideologies. This is what I call ‘being entrapped by an idea’. Even muslim women today, even though islam came to liberate women, they are still trapped by certain ideas or ideologies. For example, until today muslim women still ask questions that they really neednt be asking –
Why is it that the muslim
man can marry four but the muslim women cant marry four?
This is a question
that if you contemplate for four minutes you can find the answer- its not a
difficult question, the answer is very clear. Sisters ask yourself, is that
really what you want for yourself? Do you even consider it for a few minutes,
do you understand what it means to marry 4 men, cook for 4 men and have children
for 4 men?! “I had one husband and now I have four masha Allah!”
Why is it that the muslim men pray in the front and the women pray in the back?
Why do we accept
this argument that if you are in front you are better than the one in the back?
You are a muslim woman, you know how woman pray, did you consider for a minute
what would happen if women prayed in the front and the men prayed in the back. If
you think about it for a minute, you will see that it doesn't make any sense.
Why was there no female
prophet ever sent?
So what? Consider
now if there was a female prophet sent 15,000 years ago, would that make you a
better person? Would that make you sit a little bit higher perhaps? Ok, all the
prophet were males. Does that mean the brothers today are a bit better
believers because all the prophets were males? Brothers are you sitting any
taller because all the prophets were males? It means nothing to you.
But people are
trapped by these ideas and they cant escape them. So I want to do a quick survey
of the ideologies that women went through in these 2500 years. And what I want
to say is that the radical feminist movement has made life a battle between the
sexes. Life is portrayed as a battle between the men and women to see who will
become victorious. But there is no battle between men and women, there is no
conflict between men and women. when I said this, one of the sisters told “we
both win”. But that still implies there is a competition, but there is no
competition.
Women in the early western
civilisation:
When you go as far
back as Aristotle, he mentioned that women are in a way inferior to men, that
they are deficient in understanding and that they cannot be trusted. Many other
Greek philosophers seemed to agree to this as well. Along with this,
Christianity brought in it’s own issues as well.
-The early
Christians comtemplated the life of Jesus (PBUH) and saw that he did not get
married. Thus they concluded that to not marry is better than to get married.
So they innovated rahbaniya or celibacy
into their religion. Allah (swt) says in the quran “and the celibacy which they INNOVATED into the religion”.
- Adding to it, in
the book of genesis, the blame for the fall of man from paradise was entirely
put on the woman. The bible puts all the blame on the woman. (While in the
Qur’an, the blame isn’t put on the woman, and it isn’t put on the shaitan
either. Instead Allah says in the Qur’an “Adam
disobeyed his Lord..”. )
So combining the
above two facts the early Christian writers began to consider women as the cause
of evil. And because of that, they began to look at intimacy as something evil
and dirty, which was only meant to be for procreation and not enjoyment.
Early West encounters
Islam:
So, when the
Christians from the west encountered early Muslims for the first time, they
were very surprised to find that muslims marry 4 ( i. weak
narratione; can have
four wives). Thus they concluded that muslims are over sexed – men can have up
to four wives, they can have up to 70 or more virgins in paradise, surah Al
Baqarah has intercourse mentioned right in the middle of ‘itika’af’, intercourse isn’t considered a dirty thing or a bad
thing etc. And when they saw the muslim
women fully covered, they said it’s because if they weren’t fully covered, the savage
wild Muslim men would attack them! This whole concept of sex not being wrong
was a very big problem for them.
Enlightened era in the
West:
During this period,
they underwent a lot of re-examining of their existing believes and ideas. Some of these changes were
scientific, like they now believed it was the earth that revolved around the
sun and not the other way round. Som of the changes being theological, like
Martin Luther King protesting against some issues in the catholic church and
some of these changes were social.
The social
believes that saw a change included those related to women.
During the 1700s, Voltaire, a French Enlightenment
writer, historian and philosopher advocated that there should be education for
women, but it should be according to their lower intellect and according to
what they could understand.
Later on, in the 1800s, there were
more women’s rights movements all around.
Industrial revolution and sexual revolution:
Then came the industrial revolution, which saw many women entering work
force along with men. And this saw the demand of equal pay for women as given
to men.
Soon, the 60’s and 70’s saw the sexual revolution. After this, promiscuity
and all other forms of deviance from the norm were seen as perfectly okay –
nothing was wrong with it.
Later in the 90’s, the issue of gender arose – it was now
believed that there is no difference between men and women, it all depends on
the upbringing and if they are brought up the same way, they will be exactly
the same. For instance, a mayor once even went to the extent of saying that if
the men can walk topless on a beach, why cant the women!
In Islam, we have no problem with the differences
between men and women, we recognize the differences. Consider if a women in her third trimester of
pregnancy was expected to fast just like everyone else – if the man fasts, the
woman fasts – it wouldn’t be fair!
Thus presently, the west has come so far from its
early believes that it now considers muslims as uptight, not inter-mingling and
not relaxed enough in our society etc.
The
Muslim Women today
We have to agree that the Muslim women today are not
in a good place. This is not because of Islam but because of the cultures, ideologies
and other things that bring women down. But unfortunately, many of them who
want to “liberate” the Muslim women want to attack the religion – this worked
for the west because their values were written by men. But our values are
timeless, they are written by Allah and the prophet (saw) and these values are
exactly what will liberate us.
People always want to attack the hijab. Ok, lets see
what happens when you remove the hijab. Are
you really liberated when you remove the hijab? A non muslim student at
UCLA, California, who was a senior in psychology major, decided to experiment
with the hijab. She put on the hijab and went out, and later wrote an article
about it, in which she says –
“By covering myself, I did not cover my femininity, the only thing I covered was my sexuality. By covering the later, it allowed me to express more the former. The more I could cover my sexuality, the more I could be free and be a human being.” -
You
can read up here: http://idealmuslimah.com/dress/khimaar/3556-a-chinese-american-non-muslim-woman-experiments-with-hijaab.html
Women
in America:
In America, people will not accept a woman in high
leadership position if she looks likes a woman – if she is effeminate. She has
to look ‘androgynous’ - a woman who has
short hair, wears business suits and acts more like a man. If she dresses and
behaves feminine, she becomes a sexual object and a man would think “I’m not going
to take orders from a sexual object”. Thus, woman are still trapped. They think
they are liberated, but infact they are still trapped. And we say the only way
out of this entrapment is ISLAM.
But
some women, they attack Islam, the hadiths and they even start
questioning the meanings of the ayahs of the Quran. They think that their fight
is with Islam.
Islam never ever oppressed women. Infact your fight is with the cultures and ideologies. The issues which oppress women today are the issues of the jahiliya – honour killings, dowry given to the man, putting women as objects on magazine covers, etc. They are not issues brought about by Islam.
So its actually ironic when these women, shackled by these ideologies, come to the ‘semi-liberated’ Muslim women (‘semi’ because they are still partly shackled by their cultures) and try to liberate the Muslim women.
Conclusion:
What we actually need liberation from is the oppressive
ideologies and not Islam. And this is the responsibility of every individual,
both men and women – not just women.
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