![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.islamreligion.com\/articles\/images\/Women_in_Islam_(part_1_of_2)_001.jpg\")
The issue of gender equity is important, relevant, and current.\u00a0 Debates and writings on the subject are increasing and are diverse in their perspectives.\u00a0 The Islamic perspective on the issue is the least understood and most misrepresented by non-Muslims and some Muslims as well.\u00a0 This article is intended to provide a brief and authentic exposition of what Islam stands for in this regard.![\"\"](\"http:\/\/whoismohamed.com\/wp-includes\/js\/tinymce\/plugins\/wordpress\/img\/trans.gif\" "\\"More...\\""){kind=spacer}
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
In order to truly understand the status women have been given through Islam, one must compare it with other systems of law that exist today and that existed in the past.<\/p>\n
(1)\u00a0\u00a0The Indian System<\/strong>: It is stated in the Encyclopedia Britannica<\/em>, 1911: \u201cIn India, subjection was a cardinal principle.\u00a0 Day and night must women be held by their protectors in a state of dependence says Manu.\u00a0 The rule of inheritance was agnatic, that is descent traced through males to the exclusion of females.\u201d\u00a0 In Hindu scriptures, the description of a good wife is as follows: \u201ca woman whose mind, speech and body are kept in subjection, acquires high renown in this world, and, in the next, the same abode with her husband.\u201d (Mace,\u00a0Marriage East and West<\/em>).<\/p>\n (2)\u00a0\u00a0The Greek System<\/strong>: In Athens, women were not better off than either the Indian or the Roman women: \u201cAthenian women were always minors, subject to some male – to their father, to their brother, or to some of their male kin.\u201d (Allen, E. A.,\u00a0History of Civilization<\/em>).\u00a0 Her consent in marriage was not generally thought to be necessary and \u201cshe was obliged to submit to the wishes of her parents, and receive from them her husband and her lord, even though he were stranger to her.\u201d (Previous Source)<\/p>\n (3)\u00a0\u00a0The Roman System<\/strong>: A Roman wife was described by a historian as: \u201ca babe, a minor, a ward, a person incapable of doing or acting anything according to her own individual taste, a person continually under the tutelage and guardianship of her husband.\u201d (Previous Source).\u00a0 In\u00a0The Encyclopedia Britannica<\/em>, 1911, we find a summary of the legal status of women in the Roman civilization: \u201cIn Roman Law a woman was even in historic times completely dependent.\u00a0 If married she and her property passed into the power of her husband . . . the wife was the purchased property of her husband, and like a slave acquired only for his benefit.\u00a0 A woman could not exercise any civil or public office . . . could not be a witness, surety, tutor, or curator; she could not adopt or be adopted, or make will or contract.\u201d<\/p>\n (4)\u00a0\u00a0The Scandinavian System<\/strong>: Among the Scandinavian races women were: \u201cunder perpetual tutelage, whether married or unmarried.\u00a0 As late as the Code of Christian V, at the end of the 17th Century, it was enacted that if a woman married without the consent of her tutor he might have, if he wished, administration and usufruct of her goods during her life.\u201d (The Encyclopedia Britannica<\/em>, 1911).<\/p>\n (5)\u00a0\u00a0The British System<\/strong>: In Britain, the right of married women to own property was not recognized until the late 19th Century, \u201cBy a series of acts starting with the Married Women\u2019s Property Act in 1870, amended in 1882 and 1887, married women achieved the right to own property and to enter into contracts on a par with spinsters, widows, and divorcees.\u201d (Encyclopedia Britannica, 1968).\u00a0 In France, it was not until 1938 that the French Law was amended so as to recognize the eligibility of women to contract.\u00a0 A married woman, however, was still required to secure her husband\u2019s permission before she could dispense with her private property.<\/p>\n (6)\u00a0\u00a0In the Mosaic (Jewish) Law:<\/strong> The wife was betrothed.\u00a0 Explaining this concept, the\u00a0Encyclopedia Biblica<\/em>, 1902, states: \u201cTo betroth a wife to oneself meant simply to acquire possession of her by payment of the purchase money; the betrothed is a girl for whom the purchase money has been paid.\u201d\u00a0 From the legal point of view, the consent of the girl was not necessary for the validation of her marriage. \u201cThe girl\u2019s consent is unnecessary and the need for it is nowhere suggested in the Law.\u201d (Previous Source).\u00a0 As to the right of divorce, we read in the\u00a0Encyclopedia Biblica<\/em>: \u201cThe woman being man\u2019s property, his right to divorce her follows as a matter of course.\u201d\u00a0 The right to divorce was held only by man,\u00a0The Encyclopedia Britannica<\/em>, 1911, states: \u201cIn the Mosaic Law divorce was a privilege of the husband only…\u201d<\/p>\n (7)\u00a0\u00a0The Christian Church<\/strong>: the position of the Christian Church until recent centuries seems to have been influenced by both the Mosaic Law and by the streams of thought that were dominant in its contemporary cultures.\u00a0 In their book,\u00a0Marriage East and West<\/em>, David and Vera Mace wrote: \u201cLet no one suppose, either, that our Christian heritage is free of such slighting judgments.\u00a0 It would be hard to find anywhere a collection of more degrading references to the female sex than the early Church Fathers provide.\u00a0 Lecky, the famous historian, speaks of \u2018these fierce incentives which form so conspicuous and so grotesque a portion of the writing of the Fathers . . . woman was represented as the door of hell, as the mother of all human ills.\u00a0 She should be ashamed at the very thought that she is a woman.\u00a0 She should live in continual penance on account of the curses she has brought upon the world.\u00a0 She should be ashamed of her dress, for it is the memorial of her fall.\u00a0 She should be especially ashamed of her beauty, for it is the most potent instrument of the devil.\u2019\u00a0 One of the most scathing of these attacks on woman is that of Tertullian: \u2018Do you know that you are each an Eve? \u00a0The sentence of God on this sex of yours lives in this age; the guilt must of necessity live too.\u00a0 You are the devil\u2019s gateway; you are the unsealer of that forbidden tree; you are the first deserters of the divine law; you are she who persuades him whom the devil was not valiant enough to attack.\u2019\u00a0 Not only did the church affirm the inferior status of woman, it deprived her of legal rights she had previously enjoyed.\u201d<\/p>\n In the midst of the darkness that engulfed the world, the divine revelation echoed in the wide desert of Arabia in the seventh Century with a fresh, noble, and universal message to humanity, described below.<\/p>\n (1)\u00a0 According to the Holy Quran, men and women have the same human spiritual nature:<\/p>\n \u201cO mankind, fear your Lord, who created you from one soul and created from it its mate and dispersed from both of them many men and women…\u201d (Quran 4:1, see also 7:189, 42:11, 16:72, 32:9, and 15:29)<\/p>\n (2)\u00a0 God has invested both genders with inherent dignity and has made men and women, collectively the trustees of God on earth (see the Quran 17:70 and 2:30).<\/p>\n (3)\u00a0 The Quran does not blame woman for the \u201cfall of man,\u201d nor does it view pregnancy and childbirth as punishments for \u201ceating from the forbidden tree.\u201d\u00a0 On the contrary, the Quran depicts Adam and Eve as equally responsible for their sin in the Garden, never singling out Eve for blame.\u00a0 Both repented, and both were forgiven (see the Quran 2:36-37 and 7:19-27).\u00a0 In fact, in one verse (Quran 20:121) Adam specifically was blamed.\u00a0 The Quran also esteems pregnancy and childbirth as sufficient reasons for the love and respect due to mothers from their children (Quran 31:14 and 46:15).<\/p>\n (4)\u00a0 Men and women have the same religious and moral duties and responsibilities.\u00a0 Each human being shall face the consequences of his or her deeds:<\/p>\n \u201cAnd their Lord responded to them (saying): Never will I allow to be lost the work of (any) worker among you, whether male or female; you are of one another…\u201d (Quran 3:195, see also 74:38, 16:97, 4:124, 33:35, and 57:12)<\/p>\n (5)\u00a0 The Quran is quite clear about the issue of the claimed superiority or inferiority of any human, male or female.\u00a0 The sole basis for superiority of any person over another is piety and righteousness not gender, color, or nationality (see the Quran 49:13).<\/p>\n (1)\u00a0 The Right to Possess Personal Property: Islam decreed a right of which woman was deprived both before Islam and after it (even as late as this century), the right of independent ownership.\u00a0 The Islamic Law recognizes the full property rights of women before and after marriage.\u00a0 They may buy, sell, or lease any or all of their properties at will.\u00a0 For this reason, Muslim women may keep (and in fact they have traditionally kept) their maiden names after marriage, an indication of their independent property rights as legal entities.<\/p>\n (2)\u00a0 Financial Security and Inheritance Laws: Financial security is assured for women.\u00a0 They are entitled to receive marital gifts without limit and to keep present and future properties and income for their own security, even after marriage.\u00a0 No married woman is required to spend any amount at all from her property and income on the household.\u00a0 The woman is entitled also to full financial support during marriage and during the \u201cwaiting period\u201d (iddah) in case of divorce or widowhood.\u00a0 Some jurists require, in addition, one year\u2019s support for divorce and widowhood (or until they remarry, if remarriage takes place before the year is over).\u00a0 A woman who bears a child in marriage is entitled to child support from the child\u2019s father.\u00a0 Generally, a Muslim woman is guaranteed support in all stages of her life, as a daughter, wife, mother, or sister.\u00a0 The financial advantages accorded to women and not to men in marriage and in family have a social counterpart in the provisions that the Quran lays down in the laws of inheritance, which afford the male, in most cases, twice the inheritance of a female.\u00a0 Males do not always inherit more; at times a woman inherits more than a man. In instances where the men inherit more they ultimately are financially responsible for their female relatives: their wives, daughters, mothers, and sisters.\u00a0 Females inherit less but retain their share for investment and financial security, without any legal obligation to spend any part of it, even for their own sustenance (food, clothing, housing, medication, etc).\u00a0 It should be noted that before Islam, women themselves were sometimes objects of inheritance (see the Quran 4:19).\u00a0 In some western countries, even after the advent of Islam, the whole estate of the deceased was given to his\/her eldest son.\u00a0 The Quran, however, made it clear that both men and women are entitled to a specified share of the estate of their deceased parents or close relatives.\u00a0 God has said:<\/p>\n \u201cFor men is a share of what the parents and close relatives leave, and for women is a share of what the parents and close relatives leave, be it little or much, an obligatory share.\u201d (Quran 4:7)<\/p>\n (3)\u00a0 Employment: With regard to the woman\u2019s right to seek employment, it should be stated first that Islam regards her role in society as a mother and a wife as her most sacred and essential one.\u00a0 Neither maids nor baby sitters can possibly take the mother\u2019s place as the educator of an upright, complex-free, and carefully-reared child.\u00a0 Such a noble and vital role, which largely shapes the future of nations, cannot be regarded as idleness.\u00a0 However, there is no decree in Islam that forbids women from seeking employment whenever there is a necessity for it, especially in positions which fit her nature best and in which society needs her most.\u00a0 Examples of these professions are nursing, teaching (especially children), medicine, and social and charitable work.<\/p>\n Comment<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Introduction The issue of gender equity is important, relevant, and current.\u00a0 Debates and writings on the subject are increasing and are diverse in their perspectives.\u00a0 The Islamic perspective on the issue is the least understood and most misrepresented by non-Muslims … Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=194"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":195,"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194\/revisions\/195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.whoismohamed.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Foundations of Spiritual and Human Equity in Islam<\/h2>\n
The Economic Aspect of Women in Islam<\/h2>\n