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Madinat al-Muslimeen Islamic Message Board
| The Wise Woman |
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| a_Silver_Rose |
| 04/15/03 at 22:48:16 |
| [slm] The Wise Woman By Muneer Attyah Islam Online, Cairo Our tradition is full of advice to women in general, especially those who are getting married. Advice such as: how to be a good wife, how to be a righteous wife, how to fulfill her husbands needs, etc. What is conspicuous about our heritage is that most, if not all of this guidance is based on the assumption that it is the woman who should do her utmost and make sacrifices for the sake of her husband and her house. This issue is looked at as a sacred” mission. It is a must that the woman has to do because she should only blame herself if the marriage collapses. Imagine the amount of physical, mental, and psychological burden imposed on women, and how much work they have to do in order to keep their marriage, their houses, and their families intact? These concerns are not taken into consideration because, strangely enough, we do not give enough attention to womens concerns and their sacrifices. Why do we have so much literature with advice for women, while this literature ignores the role of man and the nature of sacrifice he has to make in order to keep his family intact as well? When we look at our tradition we find that, the only advice out there for young men deals with work, politics, status, manhood, etc. The literature focuses on personal promotion and the investment on his own future and self-interests, not the interests of his wife and his family. To women, her house and her husband are depicted as her future and central focus. She is looked upon by the literature as an“incomplete being” that is in constant need of guidance. She is seen as irrational mentally, and in need of continuous advice to be reminded of her role. This is why literature keeps reminding her of her role, and the sacrifices she has to make and the investment she needs to make in her husband and her house. Women are being treated unfairly, especially those who do not have the opportunity to get an education. Most social values promote male advancement, and consequently, put females down. Women are not given equal opportunities to develop their skills and God-given abilities to compete with their male counterparts. Let us look at the following advice given by Omama Bint Alhareth to her daughter, Um Iass on her wedding day. This is considered to be among the most famous pieces of advice given by a mother to her daughter throughout our history. She said “Oh my daughter, your are about to leave the nest you were born in and raised in to a nest that you are not aware of, and to a companion you have not been acquainted with. Remember these ten things; you will be better off, and he will be very appreciative to you – submission with satisfaction; be a good listener; be obedient; be careful where he looks or smiles, do not let his eyes fall on a filthy thing of you; be careful of his sleeping time and his food, hunger is upsetting and sleep disruption is annoying; be careful in spending his money, the best in money management is moderation; do not ever disobey an order of his and do not tell his secrets, because if you disobey him you will annoy him and if you tell his secrets you should not feel safe from his tricks; I warn you of showing happiness when he is sad or showing sadness when he is happy.” This is the wise woman, but who is the wise man that should deserve such a woman? Next week, we discuss the wise man. [color=Purple] (posted in the akhwat) [/color] http://www.islamonline.net/iol-english/dowalia/society-08-03-2000/society3.asp |
| 05/25/03 at 18:18:40 |
| a_Silver_Rose |
| Re: The Wise Woman |
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| Rameeza |
| 04/16/03 at 14:34:11 |
| [slm] Finally, some one put into writing! I feel that as we raise our daughters, even at a very tender age we talk about the man she will marry and condition her into the submissive and self sacrificing wife, whom we promote. Yet I think that the Quran and Sunnah give enough advice to women and men on their roles and their commitments and responsibilities towards each other and to themselves. I think the fault lies within us, for the tilt in the scale of importance that we have given for a woman's role towards her family. We don't talk to our sons about their wives to be. We don't REPEATEDLY tell them to be kind and understanding towards their women. We don't make his role as a husband to be all consuming, the way we do with women. I don't thinkwe need to with men or women but we need to equally do this. When I was younger and living with my family, my aunts would serve the best food etc in the house to the men and thus the boys. All things were done formally for them. Then I decided that if I ever had a son, they will EARN the favors given to them just like the girls. Even when it comes to errors done by the parties. Most men's shortcomings are not magnified. Let a woman do 1/10 th the msitake and the roof would come down. Sheesh!!!! I am sorry to say this but many 'good muslims' behave like this. Its sad and might lead to sisters who have not really looked into reading about Islam etc to feel ill about Islam. My only answer is to RAISE THE BOYS AS GOOD HUSBANDS [] like you raise the girls as good wives. See we raise our girls by saying that to be a good muslima you need to be a kind, considerat wife . For men this connection is not made. ::) |
| Re: The Wise Woman |
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| a_Silver_Rose |
| 04/16/03 at 15:53:21 |
| [wlm] Some very good points Sis Rameeza. I agree with you completely. Now Im thinking maybe I should have posted this in the ikhwat (mens) and the wise man maybe in the ahkwats.? Jannah what do you think? Do you think we can change this around? |
| 04/16/03 at 15:53:51 |
| a_Silver_Rose |
| Re: The Wise Woman |
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| UmmWafi |
| 04/19/03 at 12:39:05 |
| [slm] I have a boy and a girl (so far :D). I doubt I will ever succeed in raising them to be a good wife or a good husband specifically because in all my years of living on this earth, I have yet to see a formula that would guarantee one to be a good spouse or a happy marriage. My aunt was a very obedient, loving and gentle wife and a good mother. She was raised to be that way. Her husband left her to marry a woman who was divorced twice. Duh. What I will try to do instead is to raise my children to be good people, good Muslims who live their lives according to values and virtues embedded in the Qur'aan and the teaching of our Beloved Prophet [saw], Insha'Allah. The day before either of them gets married, I will most probably tell them this. "Marriage is a ni'mah bestowed upon you by Allah SWT. As with all ni'mah, you should always be thankful to Allah and not forsake what He has Blessed. Your future wife/husband is a Muslimah/Muslim who Allah has Chosen for you. Do not harm her/his heart, mind and soul, not intentionally, because to hurt a Creation of Allah is to distance yourself from Him. Love him/her for the sake of Allah because the journey to Jannah will be easier if the path is smooth than rough. Last but not least, I want you to remember that I have always loved you and I will always continue to love you. I will always be here.". After that, they have my du'a. Allahu 'alam bissawab. Wassalam. |
| Re: The Wise Woman |
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| a_Silver_Rose |
| 04/26/03 at 02:17:00 |
| [slm] [quote]]What I will try to do instead is to raise my children to be good people, good Muslims who live their lives according to values and virtues embedded in the Qur'aan and the teaching of our Beloved Prophet , Insha'Allah. [/quote] Alhumdulilah. Insh'Allah sister. I believe that good character/morals and the fear/love of Allah (swt) leads one to being a good spouse. [quote]The day before either of them gets married, I will most probably tell them this. "Marriage is a ni'mah bestowed upon you by Allah SubHana Wa Ta`ala. As with all ni'mah, you should always be thankful to Allah and not forsake what He has Blessed. Your future wife/husband is a Muslimah/Muslim who Allah has Chosen for you. Do not harm her/his heart, mind and soul, not intentionally, because to hurt a Creation of Allah is to distance yourself from Him. Love him/her for the sake of Allah because the journey to Jannah will be easier if the path is smooth than rough. Last but not least, I want you to remember that I have always loved you and I will always continue to love you. I will always be here.". After that, they have my du'a. [/quote] Subhan'Allah! May Allah (Swt) Bless you and your children. May Allah (Swt) bless you all with happiness in this life and in the hereafter. Ameen your sister |
| 04/26/03 at 15:54:34 |
| a_Silver_Rose |
| Re: The Wise Woman |
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| mr-bean |
| 04/26/03 at 08:02:25 |
| [slm] ...lets accept the fact that one of the biggest reasons why muslims and islam is in the doldrums is because of the appalling treatment of women... ...now why is that? i believe a significant part of the blame lies with women....particularly mothers... ...so-called good mothers spoil their sons to such extent that it is mindboggling. i know of moms who warm the beds of their adult sons by lying in them for 15 minutes so their adult sons will have a warm bed to sleep in!!!!!! i know of mothers who still set out the clothes that their adult sons are going to wear that day, who fold their clothes, organize their drawers, make their beds....!!!!!!! and i know of even much, much worse...but i will not further humiliate my gender by recounting them! when these boys get married....what kind of wives do their moms look for? ANSWER: wives who will give their sons the same kind of atttention and dote on them in the same way....! so what kind of a female population does that produce? a very docile population centered around catering for males --- and voila that is what you have. and what do males then do? since they're getting so much essentially for free, they feel little compunction about abusing that. they don't feel ashamed to ask for more, and gradually this seems to take on a life its own -- and they come to expect the doting, the attention and the obediance. and when they don't they up comes the hand, the threats, domestic abuse, etc.... i don't know....but i think muslims have to get beyond this expectation of blind obediance. else it relegates a possibly very usefull half of society to glorified servanthood. i know lots of you guys and gals out there will accuse me of advocating a western and unislamic approach to these things... but look deeply into our traditions: what is the basic, the most basic modus operandi in male-female relations? it is i believe the following "none of you truly believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself" (sahih) some very bigoted boys apply this hadith to only male-male relations, but i believe their is a much widely held belief that this applies the male-females relations. so yes, obediance is important (we all know that). but it should be within the confines of the above hadith. you might be wondering why me, a guy, would be so interested in this issue and attack my own gender, well...i have 3 younger sisters...and only Allah knows what kind of guys they are going to end up marrying... |
| 04/26/03 at 13:09:22 |
| mr-bean |
| Re: The Wise Woman |
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| a_Silver_Rose |
| 04/26/03 at 15:53:31 |
| [wlm] Brother I agree that this happens. But Brother please refrain from saying 'muslim'. This also happens in India among hindus, ect. I have heard my hispanic friends complain of this also. I guess because the man who is the one who is gonna bring home the dough, huh. In the united states its a very big thing also. Girls should always look pretty for the guys, ect. (I guess people do it in diff ways in diff cultures). I have learned this in psychology. So this is pretty much a universal thing. Some stuff is ok to do I believe like: [quote]i know of mothers who still set out the clothes that their adult sons are going to wear that day, who fold their clothes, organize their drawers, make their beds....!!!!!!! [/quote] this is also,I believe universal. Im not sure about mothers but I do think its ok for wives to do. Well wives do these things for their hubs (i know in my family they do) is normal. but wives also dont go to work and take care of outside problems. So they give each other and they arent trying to 'spoil' their hubs but doing their share of the work in a way. So I guess it really depends how far it goes and who is doing what. Alhumdulilah Islam gives men and woman equal rights/duties and the Prophet [saw] said: [i]when a man marries, he has fulfilled half of his religion , so let him fear Allah regarding the remaining half[/i] and the Prophet [saw] said: [i]The best Muslim is one who is the best husband. [/i] So I believe a truly religious man would fear Allah (swt) on how he treats his wife. May Allah (swt) bless your sisters with the best of husbands. Ameen. Just have faith in Allah (swt) and make du'a for them, and insh'Allah they will always be happy. take care your sister |
| 04/26/03 at 16:08:23 |
| a_Silver_Rose |
| Re: The Wise Woman |
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| Rameeza |
| 05/23/03 at 15:49:58 |
| Hey I did not realise that this was moved here! I do agree with you silverrose that it happens in many cultures and communities but we have to focus on ourselves when we are trying to improve the status of women in our communities. I just think that sometimes women are our greatest foe. When there are mother-in-law, daughter-in-law issues, I always wonder why it happens. The mother in law was once a daughter in law. The daughter in law usually knows how hard it is for the mother in law by the examples in her own family etc. So why do they behave in that manner. If they could just look upon each other as mother and daughter and carve off the "in law" part, all things would be solved. My theory is that if we stuck together and made moves to help each other out and NEVER, I repeat NEVER! broke the sisterhood code, the men would not know what hit them. Weaker sex? It would be unheard of! [] [] I did not mean that we should raise our children only as good husbands and wives but when we are drilling them on this subject lets not go easy on the boys. I know this is in the brothers board but, let me tell you something. We should actually drill the boys a little MORE to turn back the effects of our forefathers. Hopefully, the next generation of sisters would not have to deal with some of the problems that we have today. :) Good luck! heh heh heh heh I know Im about to get it from the bros for daring to utter such stuff on their turf. Well, bring it on! [] [] [] [] [] [] [] |
| Re: The Wise Woman |
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| Nomi |
| 05/25/03 at 18:08:31 |
| TIME OUT plz i sometimes get punched by my younger sis, what about my RIGHTS :) :) Asim Zafar |
| Re: The Wise Woman |
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| Rameeza |
| 05/28/03 at 13:25:40 |
| [slm] What right? ;D ;D ;D I was not aware of any... ;) |
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