What is the ruling on the hadith that a woman would be cursed were she to disobey the desires of the husband? What should be the interpretation of this hadith and what are the folds to this? What are the duties of the husband and wife towards each other?
Shaykh Yasir Qadhi answers.
Is it true that the prophets of the law who said him said that a woman who doesn't answer her husband when he calls her will be cursed by the angels?
Oh, yes, it is true that our prophets of the law he said them did say that a woman should answer the call of her husband. Now what does it mean the call of her husband, this is a gentle or a generic way of saying that when the husband desires his wife and wants intimacy, the woman should not turn him down. Now, obviously, the purpose of this habit again, the point of this hadith is that the Prophet system is telling women that they have a right or they have an obligation to answer their call of the call of their husbands in this regard, as long as they don't have a legitimate excuse. So obviously, something of a severe headache or they're sick or something, obviously, in that
situation, they may tell their husbands of this, and the husband should also take that into account. However, women should not deprive their husbands of intimacy, based on an argument based on a personal, you know, thing that happened on that date, because this is going to end up harming the marriage. Now, it's a two way street. By the way, the husband can never deprive the woman of her livelihood, of her sustenance of her food and drink of paying the rent. So the husband is always obliged to take care of the wife, no matter how bad of an argument they have, the husband has to make sure his wife has food, a roof over her head clothes to wear, he has to take care of her needs.
Now, the woman as well as a bare minimum that she has to take care of the needs of the husband and our profit system in order to save the marriage in order to make sure marriages don't collapse. If a woman deprives her husband of that need out of spite out of anger, this is a recipe for disaster. And it's going to really end up hurting maybe even ending up in divorce. And so our profit system is telling women for the sake of Allah for the sake of their Creator, don't do it for your husband, don't do it for him, do it. If you're a believing lady, and you want to earn the pleasure of Allah. Don't open up this door of depriving your husband of intimacy simply because of a personal issue
that has happened. So we again we need to understand the goal and the spirit of the Hadith. The purpose of the Hadith really is teaching men and women what what is the red line that should not be crossed when it comes to marital issues? other you know, if and verses they tell us the role of the man is that he is the one who is responsible for the woman. So it can, as I said, be reversed and we can tell the men under no circumstance Can you
deprive your wife of sustenance or of what not. In fact, our Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said, of the rights of the woman that have that she has over a husband is that the husband can never kick her out of the house can never be harsh with her can never curse her. So there's a minimal level. And some of the companions would have fights with their wives, such as ID and Fatima, the daughter of the processing and the son in law, they had a fight. And the processor went to try to resolve it. And he finds out that Fatima's in the house alone, and he asks, Where is it and she says he went to the masjid and he was sleeping in the masjid. So when there was a fight, it rhodiola one
went outside and slept in the masjid not faulting him, it slept outside, not Fatima, the husband never mistreats the wife no matter how bad the fight becomes. And therefore, as we said, it's a two way street here, just like the husband has a bare minimum. So to the wife has a bare minimum. That's really the purpose and the goal, and each of the two parties has to do it for the sake of Allah, not necessarily for each other sake, and if they do that, then inshallah the marriage has a chance of flourishing and of being a sustainable and happy marriage.