The Muslim woman has become the ultimate symbol of Islam in our times and there are calls for a feminist movement within Islam. Fatima Barkatulla takes a closer and more holistic look at Islam’s vision for women and asks: Does Islam Need Feminism?
What is the solution to the oppression of women in our community where it exists?
Have Muslim scholars interpreted the Islamic texts with a male skew?
Billahi min ash shaytani r rajim Bismillahi Rahmani Raheem
in Alhamdulillah mahamadou who are no mana sofiero when i o Billahi min Cerulean fusina
Marina
de la, la la la palabra de la eyeshadow Allah Allah Allah Allah, Allah, Allah, Masha Allah Mohammed Abu rasuluh. Indeed All praise is due to Allah, we praise Him, we seek his help, and we seek His forgiveness, whom we seek protection in a lot from the evil of ourselves and from the evil consequences of our actions.
Whomsoever Allah guides, none can misguide. And whomsoever Allah leaves astray and uncon guide, I bear witness that there is nothing worthy of worship except Allah alone without any partners. And I bear witness that Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam the Servant and Messenger
My dear sisters in Islam as salaam aleikum wa rahmatullah wa barakato.
And thank you for welcoming me to Cardiff and inviting me here from the lab have been here for quite a long time. So it's nice to be back.
The question we're going to be asking today is does Islam need feminism. And this is an incredibly topical subject to be talking about. It's also an incredibly controversial subject to talk about. But I think it's an important subject for us to to be clear about because in our times, broadly, there are different answers to this question that people usually give. There are those who say that, yes, Islam definitely does need feminism. Because Islam, like all other religions, is misogynistic,
misogynistic meaning,
it has an inherent hatred of women ingrained into the religion. They say it is patriarchal.
And so they say, yes, you know, Islam, just like other religions, needs feminism in order to bring equality and bring rights to women that the women deserve.
There are also those who say, No, we believe in Islam. We believe this is the religion of God. We believe in the Quran, we believe in the Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu, alayhi wasallam. But Islam for the last 1400 years, has been interpreted mainly by male scholars, they will say, and so this has given Islam at best, a male skew and at worst, it has made Islam completely sexist.
And so they would say, yes, we do need feminist movement within Islam. We need to reinterpret some of the verses of the Quran, in fact, and we need to reassess the Hadith. And we need to reform our understanding of Islam. So they saying that we do believe in Islam, we are Muslims. But it's not the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is not Islam, it's not as it was revealed that there's anything wrong with it's just that ever since it was revealed, it's just been all interpreted wrong.
Then there are those who sisters who say, No, Islam doesn't need feminism, but Muslims do. Okay? So they will say, Well, look, if you look around the world, you look at the news, even you hear about so much oppression, especially oppression of Muslim woman going on. And so we just genuinely sincerely want to address that oppression. And we want to restore the rights of women to them. So we are feminists in that regard, you know, so we have a feminist.
We have a lot in common with the feminist. And so therefore, we can call ourselves some of this and we will get involved with the, you know, with feminist groups, etc.
So, these are broadly the three kind of answers that we usually hear
in order to answer this question properly and to really do it justice. First of all, we need to look at Islam.
A little closer. And the second thing we need to do is look at feminism a little closer.
So and the reason why I'm doing this sisters is that
you know, the view of Islam that's constantly project constantly presented to us, the things we constantly come into our ears, the talk that we constantly hear, whether it's from the media, whether it's social media,
Whether it's you know, around us in a university at work, when we hear about women in Islam, we often hear about it with a very reductionist approach. What I mean about that, what I mean by that is that instead of looking at Islam as a, as a whole, and looking at what Islam says about women and men, in a holistic way,
something and we know that Islam is comprehensive, what people do is they focus and hone in on one particular law, or they focus on homing on another particular verse. And then instead of putting it into context, and looking at Islam as a whole, they'll just focus on that one or one thing. And by doing that, what happens is that our own understanding our own feelings for Islam sometimes change. So we get affected. I remember when I was a student, I was just 16 years old. And I just moved to Cairo.
And I had all these books with me, I don't know where I got them from, but they were all kind of anti.
They were written by Westerners about women behind the veil and these kinds of books, you know, these kind of orientalist type books. And I was reading them. And by the end of reading one or two of them, I remember feeling really depressed as a Muslim woman. You know, I started thinking, I know, this isn't the Islam that my parents want me up with.
Is this way Sam says about women is this really the value that women have? And I felt really angry and I felt really upset, so I can really empathize with people who feel those things. Okay. And what it took for me to re re establish my Eman in a strong way. And for me to realize that I was thinking in the wrong way was not to try and change Islam. He was actually to go back to the basics. And remember what Islam is as a whole for women, and sometimes we've become very disconnected from that. So inshallah let's let's reconnect with that.
What did Allah Subhana Allah say about women?
First of all, let's think about who Allah subhanaw taala is, who is the one who is talking about women and giving us this way of life?
How does he relate to women?
Let's focus on the law giver rather than focusing constantly on the laws that he's given us.
Because when you think about Ibrahim alayhis salam, the Prophet Ibrahim Alayhi, salam, you see that he was commanded to do something that none of us have been commanded to do, which is to sacrifice his own son.
And Ibrahim Alayhi, Salam was only interested in knowing one thing.
Is this a command from Allah? Once he knew that this was a command from Allah Subhana, WA, ala. And because he knew that Allah is the one who made me, he's the one who created me. He gave me the air that I breathe, he makes my heart beats without me even asking for it. He makes my eyes blink. without me having asked for it. A Lost Planet, Allah, the One who made me who loves me, who cares about me. There's nothing that he commanded me to do, except that there's something good in it for me. And there's nothing he prohibited me from except that there's something evil in that thing for me, whether I can see it or not, because he knew that
Ibrahim Alayhi Salam was obedient, straight away. summit in our Aparna we hear and we obey. He didn't start arguing. He didn't say,
isn't this a barbaric thing for me to do? What will people think? What does society say about this thing? He didn't say, oh, Allah, are you sure that you meant sacrifice? What does the word sacrifice mean? Does it mean kill? Or does it mean? You know, maybe you mean, I should just avoid my son or I should just leave him? Do you really mean kill, as in sacrifice? He didn't ask all of these complicated questions, once it was clear to him what the command was. And because he had it so clear in his head, who the commander was, he submitted.
Okay, so Pamela, and this is because of his strong connection with Allah Subhana Allah.
So my sisters remember this deal that Allah subhanaw taala has given us and he promised that he would preserve
his Deen given by somebody who loves us. Okay. One of the first verses of the Quran that this God, this creator of ours revealed one of the earliest verses was what even Whew, that was a lot ba era
kottelat when the newborn baby will ask for what crime was she killed? This was one of the first verses. What does this verse tell you about Allah? The one who's given us this Deen of Islam? Doesn't it tell you that he loves us? Doesn't it tells you that he cares about the little baby girls that were being killed, that were voiceless. Allah subhanaw taala stood up for them and made made sure the men knew that there was going to come a day when they would be brought to account for this. This is Allah. This is the extent to which he loves us. Even as early as the beginning of Islam, Allah subhanaw taala revealed this verse.
Allah Subhana Allah is the one who said in Muslim in our Muslim as well meaning in our minute, while Pani Tina volpone. That was saw the Pina Wasabi Wasabi Dena wasabi rot, while Hershey ina will Hershey while Mutasa de Pina
was so mean I was so mad. While happy Dena Fujian will have will have Idina furuya whom will have evolved with their keys key and aloha Kathy, you know with the key rod, the law hula hoop muffuletta margarine Aviva, indeed, the Muslim, the submitting men and the submitting women,
the believing men and believing women. And he emphasized the women here as well. The obedient men and the obedient women, the truthful men and the truthful women, the patient men and the patient women, the humble men and the humble women, the charitable men and the charitable women, the men who fast and the women who forced the men who got their private parts and the women who got the private parts, the men who remember a lot often and the women who do so for them, Allah has prepared forgiveness, and a great reward. Allah Subhana Allah is emphasizing to us that don't think that you're not included in this. The men and the women are included in all of this. This is the extent
to which this creator of ours loves us. Think about the way Allah Subhana Allah talks about the mother of Musa alayhis salaam, the women in the Quran just Subhanallah we are not connected with the Quran. And this is why this talk that we hear, that tells us that Islam is against women or that there are verses in the Quran that show that Islam has been interpreted wrongly, etc. This is why this affects us because we're so disconnected with the book of Allah. If we were connected with the book of Allah, we would have no doubts. Because when we read about, for example, the mother of musala Salah, the way Allah Subhana, Allah talks about her, you know, when she was told that the
Pharaoh of the time was killing every every male baby, and she had just given birth to Musa and she felt so connected with her baby. And she knew that the policemen of Pharaoh were coming and they would be trying to look for the babies of Bani Israel of the children of Israel. What does she do, she actually had to hide him. And the way we're licensed is go back to the Quran tonight as a homework and just read that story. See how Allah subhanaw taala talks about it, how he inspired her to put the baby Moses into a basket and put him into the water. And how Allah describes how heart became completely empty.
And Allah, Allah loved her so much and cared about her so much. He's like, it shows you how much he was kind of empathizing, you know, with her, that her heart became empty. And in order for her not to have that pain. He in such an amazing way, in a way that she could never have imagined, reunited her with her baby, right. And this time, in a way in a situation where there was no fear. Her baby was in the house of Pharaoh. And she was called to be an employee of Pharaoh, right, as a witness to the baby.
And the way Allah subhanaw taala describes it, in order to bring peace to her heart law says this is how much a loved one woman
think about how Allah Subhana Allah in Surah Al majalah.
From above the seven heavens, Allah Subhana Allah heard this woman who came to the Prophet salallahu alaihe salam to complain about some abusive words or some some words that her husband had said to her, you are to me like the back of my mother, he had said to her, and that in those times was a phrase that meant that you're haram to me, you know, like my mom is haram to me. You are haram to me, I'm not gonna come near you as a wife. You're not my like my wife anymore, right? And because
He said such a terrible statement, this woman had come to the Prophet salallahu alaihe salam 's house to complain to him. And I showed her the law and she said, I was there in the house. And I was straining to be able to hear what this woman was talking about.
And I couldn't hear properly what she was talking about. And yet a lot above the seven heavens heard her and knew about her complaint and understood the difficulty and pain that she was going through. And Allah subhanaw taala reveals to her to the majority law in which he rebuked the men who say these kinds of statements to their wives, right, and told them they have to pay an expiation and a cafaro in order to resume their relations with their wives. This is the extent to which Allah loved and cared about a woman. And, you know, even Katia, the famous Mufasa
says in his Tafseer that a man came and said to Mr. Malhotra when he saw Mr. Pennell, Hata was greeting there was a woman and he was greeting her and welcoming her and listening to her very carefully. And this man said to her, I said to him, You left talking to a man of Quraysh in order to come to talk to this old woman. And Omar bin Al Khattab said, Woe to you. Do you not know who this woman is? And the man said, No, I said, this is the woman who's complained a lot. Listen to from above the seven heavens. This is how long I've been fallible. That was the name of the lady. What the Allah Allah, by Allah, if she did not leave me until Mike fell, I would not tell her to leave
until she had got what she came for. Unless the time for prayer came in which case I would pray and then I would come back to her until she got what she came for. To the extent you know, he was like, I would say a little bit scared, you know, that. This is the type of woman who Allah Subhana Allah rebuked the men about you know, so I'm definitely gonna listen to her.
This is Allah Subhana Allah. This is how much he cared about us. Allah subhanaw taala cared so much about eyeshadow on her and her reputation that he revealed verses of the Quran to clear her name. And Ayesha, you know, at the end of the story of the slander of Alisha, if you've ever read it or heard it, she even says, I didn't think myself significant enough that a lot would reveal verses from above the seven heavens, about me that will be recited until the end of time. I didn't know that I was significant enough and will lie. A lot showed her that she was significant. She as a woman, as a servant of Allah was significant. Look at the way Allah subhanaw taala has honored Mary
Maria alayhis salam in the Quran. Allah says that He gives the example above or below who methyl alladhina amanu merata around. If Paul let's Rob biblically in the debate and feel genuine. When a genie mean for our family when a genie minakami volley mean, when Maria mob Natasha Emraan allottee a sonnet for jaha Fanuc nafi him evil Hina was so delicate we, Kelly, Matty, Robbie have a coup to be here, where can you know quantity? Allah Subhana, Allah gives two examples of women. And he says they are an example to all those who believe men and women. He says Asya are the one who is the wife of Pharaoh, who said as she was being tortured and killed, she said, Oh Allah build for me, a house
with you in general.
build, build a house with you for me in general, and save me from Pharaoh and his evil actions and save me from these oppressive people.
And Maryam, the daughter of Emraan, who guarded her chastity. And so Allah blew into her from his room. And she was true to the words of her Lord and to his book. And she was from the devoutly obedient to the quantity. And the Vaseline, say quantity and is somebody who, who obeys Allah subhanaw taala, who submits to him completely and who stays up late in prayer for long periods of time in prayer. She was from the community. So he gave us these women as role models.
He told the men that will the Prophet sallallahu Sallam told the men the best of you are the ones who have the best towards their wives. He told the men I mean so Pamela in his last speech, it's like the the the constitution or the or the, you know, the most important speech that a leader could give one of his last major speeches, the farewell sermon, the profits are low, what he was selling them stood up and in one of the things he emphasized to the men was fear of love with regards to the women because
They have been made halaal for you by the words of Allah. Okay? He told them feel a love with regards to women, that is completely unique in human history for a leader of so many people, a leader of a civilization to mention women in that way.
He told the men, your mother, your mother, your mother, she has more right to companionship and your good treatment than anyone else. So, my dear sisters, when we talk about the religion of Allah, as if it's comparable to any kind of way of life of today, or as if we can judge it with the limited minds that we have, we can judge it by the standards of, you know, modern day society. We belittle Allah when we do that, you know, Allah says, well, Mercado la la casa de la casa de, they did not give Allah His due right and value, this is what we do, we don't give Allah His due right and value. And we compare this religion, this way of life that lots of Allah to Allah creators revealed with
the standards, and the talk and the attacks of, of the modern day of the times in which we live.
So instead of looking at Islam in this holistic way, looking at the way Allah loves us, as women, as servants of his, instead of doing that, what do we do? What do people do? They focus on one law, they say, oh, why is it that you know, the brother parrots double what the system inherits? That's not very fair. So we're going to ignore all of that we're going to ignore everything I've just said. Okay. And I've just chosen a few examples. I'm going to ignore all of that. And we're going to focus on this, I'm gonna say it's unfair.
But the muslimah I mean, even just the word muslimah. What does it mean? The one who submits that submission is not just, I believe in a God is one God know, that submission is, I recognize I have a creator, who is one, I submit to Him, I submit to His will, I worship Him alone. And I recognize that he has the right to legislate for me, he has the right to give me laws, and tell me how to live my life because he is the all wise. And sometimes I might not understand the wisdom behind the laws that he's given me. But definitely, there's a wisdom. There's definitely a wisdom behind it. Whether I can see it or not. Who am I? I'm just spamela. Who are we? You know, thinking that we can look at
laws laws and think and see the wisdom behind everything in Allah knows who the who do we think we are, you know, we were just a little
a little drop
a few years ago. Yeah, something made of a liquid that if it got onto somebody's clothes, they would say, oh, and they would try and wash it off. That's what we were made from. Okay. And we think that we can go get into a loss mind and understand the wisdom of Allah.
Who do we think we are really.
So
Islam is holistic, we have to remind ourselves sisters, because all these constant attacks, they really can take their toll.
We reject that Islam is a patriarchy, this word patriarchy. One definition of patriarchy that's given is a system in which
the power relations are such that women's interests are subordinated to the interests of men. We reject this. Islam is not like this. Allah Subhana. Allah cares about the interests of both men and women. He has given us equal the equal opportunity to be people of gender.
In Islam, the highest authority is not a man. The highest authority is Allah. Allah is not a man.
And 1400 years ago, and we should remind ourselves of this, these are the things that Islam gave to women that they didn't have before. Islam, Allah subhanaw taala told us that we are equal in our value and our spiritual potential. You know, one of the leading one of the I think he was in the 12th century.
Thomas Aquinas, he said, woman is an imperfect man.
We reject that. We don't even compare ourselves to men. You know, Allah Subhana Allah says, well as a vicar, the the male is not like the female.
We don't even compare. It's wrong to compare how can you compare to beings that are different?
The Sharia is very sophisticated when it comes to
Men and women, it doesn't treat us exactly the same, because to treat men and women exactly the same would be unjust.
It balances our rights and responsibilities.
We complement each other as men and women, we are not in competition with each other. And this is one of the problems with the way people are thinking today, there's this constant competition, why can't I do what he does? Why? Why can't I
achieve the things that he's achieving, instead of looking at the unique achievements and the unique opportunities that Allah has given us as women, constantly looking at the benchmark, or the the yardstick of man, okay, and this is this is a disease that is spreading amongst women and has been amongst women. For the last century.
We both have the same goal in the sun, we both want to get to gender. Islam is here off the centric, it's not about this dunya it's not about, you know, the material things we can gain in this dunya, of fame, of money, of status, it's about the status we can achieve in the hereafter.
And yes, we do have different roles and different a different focus. And we're proud of that. One of these happy actually came to the Prophet sallallahu Sallam and this is a weak Hadith. But the meaning of this hadith is correct, as the scholars say,
she came to the Prophet sallallahu wasallam. And she said, out of Salalah, come to you on behalf of the women. You know, the men, they go out for jihad, they pray the Salah in the masjid, they give the charity they do so much outside the home. And we we are at home, we wash their clothes, we look after the kids, we bring up the children, we we do all these things behind the scenes, if you like you're saying,
then what we'll get some reward for that.
And the Prophet sallallahu alayhi Salaam in this hadith said,
What a wonderful question. And he really appreciated the question that this lady asked. And he said to her, go,
tell the women, that all of those things that you do in the house, all of those things that you're doing, they are equal to what the men are doing. They are equal.
So I asked you sisters, when we think, why is it the men who are doing this? Why is it the men who are doing that? Who are we trying to please when we asked that question? Is it not that our status with Allah should be the most important thing in our minds? So if we could achieve a high status with Allah, without taking on the roles and responsibilities of men?
Then why would we not want to do that? Why do we see, for example, leadership roles as
as a privilege? Why do we see them as a privilege? Why do we not realize that they're actually a burden? And the responsibility? Why do we see the role of the man as the one who provides for the family? financially? Why do we see that as a privilege, personal privilege? If you asked your husband, you know, could you would you rather sit at home? Would you rather be at home and the money comes rolling in? He would agree with that you would rather do that right? Why do we see as a privilege, because society has programmed us to think of it as a privilege. Because the governments of today are capitalist, materialistic governments, they only value you if you're a taxpayer. Right?
If you're not a taxpayer, you're worthless to the coffers. Right. So instead of looking at the other the the roles that women used to play in this society, which now that they've left has caused society to suffer so much, instead of valuing those and seeing the human value and the benefit to society that that used to bring, all they can see is the economic value. That's it.
And we've been affected by that.
Allah subhanaw taala has given us many privileges as women.
So Pamela, I was just reflecting, you know, my, one of my sons, he's, he just recently, you know, the prayers became obligatory on him recently. And I was thinking to myself, wow, he's really grown. My oldest son. That's thinking, from this moment onwards until the day he dies, he's gonna pray his prayers, and he's never going to have a break, right? He's never gonna get any time off. He's never gonna have an excuse to not fast unless he's traveling or he's really ill. Right.
From this moment onwards, his life has changed in a way that I don't want to like scare him, you know, and mentioned to him,
but we as women, Allah subhanaw taala gave us you know, a time off if you like.
During our menses, he made Islam and the laws of Islam. So sophisticated that they would cater for our biology, not ignore our biology, not ignore our psychology and our on our emotional makeup, but embrace it, and accommodate it, and make it and actually give us the framework in which to be able to excel without being in competition with men. But have all of our needs met.
We are not required as women to provide for the family. We're not required to I know that sometimes, you know, people in situations have to, but we're not required to, because Allah subhanaw taala recognizes that the role that we play is big enough, you know, as one of the sisters said, you know, women wanted to have it all. And now they're having to do it. All right.
We wanted to have it all. And now, who do you think does the most of the housework, even if she's a working one? Who do you think? Who do you think does most of the cooking, right? So you do a nine to five job. And then you come home, and there's no break? Just pick up way where you would have left off anyway.
This is not a privilege. This is not a privilege at all. This is a burden. And Islam freed women from that burden.
A lot of how Subhana Allah gave women inheritance, and this was something that women were not given before, not in this society, nor in Arabia 1400 years ago.
And why did Allah Subhana Allah give give men? You know, in some cases, by the way, it's not in all cases, it depends. This is the sophistication of the Sharia. It's not that Oh, women will always get half of what men get from inheritance. No, it depends on the number of people in the family depends if there's brothers or not, etc. There could be situations where a woman gets more than the men, right. But the point is that in the Quran, for example, in that one is that people keep highlighting Allah Subhana. Allah says, yes. So for example, if a person's father passed away, and she had a brother, her brother would inherit double the portion that she would.
Why is it that in 1400 years, Muslim women never complained about that? Have you ever thought about that? You know, how come it's just like in the last, very, very recently that women are starting to even ask these questions, because my sister's
women knew that there are certain burdens upon men, okay, that are not upon women, financial burdens. So anything that I inherit, for example, from my parents, is for me, and it's just for me, and I have a right to use it as I will. I don't have to spend it on my children and I have to spend it on my husband. It's completely for me as a as an individual. Whereas whatever my brother inherits, okay, if my mother is a widow, now, he will not only be using it to support himself, won't only just be his, he'll be supporting my mother. And it's not my responsibility to financially support my mother. It's his responsibility. So he is going to be paying for it for my mother. He is
going to be supporting any sisters I have that are not married. Right? He is going to be when it comes to his own marriage, he's gonna have to pay a dowry. We don't have to pay a dowry, do we? Why is it that we never hear a Muslim woman saying it's not fair? Is it that we we get to have a dowry and the men don't get a dowry?
We never had a Muslim woman complaining. It's quite unfair, isn't it? It's quite sexist that we women get a break from Salah if you want to look at it like that. And the men don't and we don't even have to make it up. You never hear women complaining? Why did the prophet SAW Selim say your mother, your mother, your mother? You know, that's quite unfair. Why is it Why is it we never hear people complaining about that.
And another example that keeps being brought up is the example of two women witnesses. Right?
That why is it that in the Quran it says that,
you know, that that the that either bring one man, male witness or two women witnesses, okay, well, again, this is a reductionist way of looking at the show yet, let's just pick on one little law and just look at it in isolation of the rest of the shittier.
My sister, did you know that I've just been studying hanafy.
There are so many instances so many situations where
one woman's witness is worth more than even 10 men's witnesses.
It depends on the situation.
See, this is what I mean by the Sharia is is sophisticated. There are certain situations where Allah has deemed or the Sharia has deemed that
woman would know better about this particular thing.
Okay, and I can give you lots of examples. I've got them in my books, where they were the the fifth books say,
if he says this, and she says that we go with what she says.
Okay, so Pamela, and we don't know this because we don't study this shutdown, right? And so then when people say these things to us, we were like, I don't know what to say. You know? So,
the Sharia is sophisticated. There depends on the situation. Yes, there are situations where Allah, Allah has said, in his infinite wisdom, that you need either two women witnesses or one man. And there are situations where he said, No, the woman would know better about this.
So
Islam also protects us.
Things like, you know, the hijab, the way we have to dress when we go out when you read the verses of when Allah subhanaw taala says, tell the believing women to you know, cover their bodies with their gela, beep
Subhan Allah, I see nothing in those verses, but love for women. You know that? Because Allah Subhana, Allah says, so that they will be recognized and not harassed, not molested, not treated in a negative way. Right?
That is a loss of anabella, showing us that he cares about us.
There's nothing anti women in that at all.
A lot of times, Allah knows the nature of men. He knows the nature of women. And he has deemed that this is what is needed. Okay.
Marriage is an empowering contract for women. You see, we don't have the same concept of marriage as Christians do. So when Christians traditionally think of marriage, they think of, you know, chains, right. And they think, oh, till death do a sport. In Islam. We don't actually have that. Of course, we want marriages to last. But the marriage is not necessarily till death do us part. And marriage is actually a contract with a woman has a right to negotiate. Pretty much anything she wants. In that marriage contract. If the man agrees to it, and he signs on the dotted line, then that's an agreement that they've made. Right.
Islam game gave women the right to own property.
Islam gave women the right to political participation. We just gave the example of the majority Ella, she could walk up to the Khalifa, can you imagine she can walk up to the leader of the day and just talk to him? Tell him what her opinion was on things.
Islam gave us a distinct identity. We don't take the names of our husbands. Right? We have our own distinct identity.
by banning fornication and adultery, Islam protected women gave a clear message to men that no, you can't just love her and leave her. No, you can't just, you know, enjoy and have your fun, and then not take any responsibility for that.
You know, if you want to be close to me, you have to commit to me a lot is empowering us and telling us don't allow yourself to be cheapened. Don't allow us value to be cheapened.
Lots of Allah tala even mentioned breastfeeding in the Quran, you know, and when you read about, you know, the breastfeeding in the Sharia books, you see that, you know, the woman who is breastfeeding is given really, like special status she's given.
You know, she has the right to be provided for, for example, by her husband, even if she's divorced. If she's breastfeeding, she continues to be provided for.
So Subhanallah education, you know, this is a hot topic as well, everyone keeps perpetuating this myth that Islam doesn't want women to be educated.
The right to education, it started with eyeshadow delana if you just look at Arusha, you know, she had such a huge impact on the Sharia. In fact, I think it was a sirkeci he zelicah she wrote a whole volume
in which he was citing different cases of how it should have
corrected the fatawa of the other Sahaba she corrected them. She said, No, that wasn't it wasn't like that. It was like this, the prophet said this. Some not, you know, she may have she may or may not have been correct about those things. Okay. But the fact that it's all recorded, her opinion and sometimes it
contradicted the opinion of some of the other Sahaba shows you her the participation of women. And then the scholars never looked at it as a woman's participation in the man's participation. When it came to Hadith, you didn't need to women to, to confirm a hadith. You know, one woman who quoted a hadith and who passed on the Hadith was sufficient. So they never looked at it like men and women.
It's just looked at the individual is looked at for their truthfulness and their background, etc.
Most scholars in Islamic history had teachers who were women, at some point in their lives. Even taymiyah, for example, he had three or four of his teachers that were women.
And, you know, it's quite famous in our times, that there are books now written about the huge numbers of Muslim female scholars who without compromising the hijab without compromising their Islam. Okay, they were able to contribute to Islamic scholarship
40 ml theory. Just one example.
A lady who just less than 200 years after the Prophet's death, okay, we're talking so far back in history. She set up the first university in the world.
The Cairo
University in Morocco. Sorry.
Yep. Cairo when
Fatima inferi. Yep. You can look her up.
To the extent that author Ruth roaded. In her book, women in Islam and the Middle East, she said,
in reading the biographies of 1000s of Muslim women scholars, one is amazed at the evidence that contradicts the view of Muslim women as marginal, secluded and restricted. In her study, she found that the proportion of female lecturers in many classical Islamic colleges was higher than in modern Western universities. Pamela, Ruth roaded, in her book, women in Islam and the Middle East, made this comment.
So this, this was what Islam gave women.
It's true, that,
you know, there are men who are oppressing women. It's true that so many rights have been taken away, but inshallah we will look at that in a moment.
feminism. In order to really appreciate and understand feminism, you've got to kind of have a brief history of feminism.
First of all, when we look at the West and Europe and America,
especially Europe, okay, we see that when Christianity
came to Europe, and when Christianity was the the main religion all over Europe,
we find that
the way in which the Bible talks about women, okay?
Eve, was responsible for the downfall of man.
In, in Genesis three, Adam blames the woman for his sin, okay, and God tells the woman that her pain that she gets in childbirth, and the pain that she gets in her menses are because of her, causing them to go astray.
In one Timothy two
in the Bible, it says, Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. Okay. And it says that because of this, women should be silent, and should be under the men. Okay, so it's like a punishment for women. Right? This is obviously alien to Islam. But this was the kind of back ground to the way Christianity viewed women. Okay. And this is why and this is something that people don't really know about. But when I researched it was shocking. Between the fifth in the 15th, to the 17th century, there were major witch hunts taking place all over Europe, and America, okay. To the point that they call them a holocaust against women. Now, the historians call them a
holocaust against women. They say up about 60,000 women were put to death. Sometimes they were little girls, okay. And anyone could be accused of being a witch, for any kind of strange behavior, as long as people just came and showed some proof. And I was reading about the way that these women who were accused of being witches were interrogated. Right, they were stripped, they were basically sexually abused before being burnt to death. Okay, or hanged.
And we're talking about over 60,000 women and that's like the conservative estimate.
Right? And in a book
published by the Catholic Inquisition or authorities in 1485.
It's called the hammer of witches. Okay? It stated all wickedness is but little to the wickedness of a woman. What else is women but a fall to friendship and unescapable punishment, a necessary evil and natural temptation, a desirable calamity, domestic danger, a delectable detriment, and evil nature painted with fair colors. Women are by nature instruments of Satan. They are by nature carnal. A structural defect rooted in the original creation. Okay.
So women were systematically being killed by the church. Yes.
Okay. It's a book called The Hammer of witches,
published by the Catholic Inquisition authorities. And this is a quote from the book of the Holocaust in historical context.
The Holocaust in historical context, by an author called cat's k t said.
So can you imagine, right? This is why, you know, the people in the West are so against religion being part of the state, right? Look at the history, just look at the history. This is just the the what happened to the women, right? What was happening to the men is a different story. But here, women were systematically being killed in the 18th century during the enlightenment. Okay, we're talking now, hundreds of years after he had established University right? In the 18th century, when women were not even allowed to set foot in two universities.
In the West, during the Enlightenment, women still had no property rights. They had no legal identity apart from
their husband's identity. They had they were not allowed to get the degree, you know, where Muslim women were giving degrees. Right and university is giving a Jazz's
women here, were not allowed to even get a degree. The mother did not have right to custody over the children.
These are just some of the things in the 19th century, the first US woman was allowed to address a lawmaking body.
Can you imagine? We were talking about Georgia law coming up to the you know, the halifa. And speaking to him directly, the women who could just come and speak to the prophets, Allah Salam when they needed to. And here in the 19th century, the you in the US, the first woman was allowed to address a lawmaking body. The first female doctor was accredited. married women, for the first time were allowed to have property under their name.
Women were allowed to be to enter universities.
But they weren't allowed to get degrees. They were just allowed to attend the classes. Okay. And this is when the word feminists first started being used,
you know, and in the early 20th century, then we see what people call what historians called the first wave of feminism, when women were allowed to get degrees. Okay, then we have the suffragettes, the suffragette movement, they wanted the right to vote.
We saw the rise of individualism, the idea that the individual is the basic unit of society, not the family. Right. And, of course, you know, women had to fight a lot in order to just get some basic rights that Islam had given women 1400 years ago. And then during the 60s and 70s, there was what we call the second wave of feminism, where this what they call the sexual revolution took place, okay, which was basically that fornication was allowed freely, right? women's bodies are owned by women, and they should be able to do whatever they want with them. The pill became available freely, more available, contraception, etc, abortion. Okay, the idea of free love. There was a huge anti marriage
movement, mocks feminists, anti the nuclear family, in fact, they would protest and they said we should have 24 hour childcare. Why should a woman have to look after children, anyone can do that.
There was a whole movement against breastfeeding, right? So the milk companies, they were kind of saying it's much better for you to just use powdered milk. Forget breastfeeding, leave your children, you don't need to be with them. When you've just given birth. Just give them this powder.
Milk, which has obviously changed now. And there was this idea that gender is a construct. Okay, this was something that the feminists were really pushing out there, that the idea that gender, being masculine being feminine being male and female,
it's just a construct. It's just something that we're conditioned into. There is no innate difference between men and women. Okay? And this was the thing that was being pushed out at that time.
And then we come to the situation that we're in today, okay, where now women are really, if you want to call it a new wave in a new wave of feminism are trying to kind of acquire many privileges now, okay. So they want there to be quotas. In boardrooms, they say, you know, we want at least 40% of boardrooms should have women, but you'll never hear them fighting for, you know, 40% of builders being women, right, or 40% of cleaners or 40% of, you know, traditionally male jobs, you know, you don't find them calling for that to be her, you know, to have quotas in, it's only the jobs that women seem to think are jobs of higher status.
So my sisters, this is just like a brief kind of history of the way the feminist movement came about. And you can see why women wanted to kind of, you know, have this movement and fight for their rights, because really, and truly, there was a lot of oppression going on. Right, basic rights were not being given to them.
But I would argue that we as Muslim women, we don't need feminism. In fact, women don't need feminism either.
Because feminism, to adopt that as your as your kind of mantra or your title, your sorry, your your label
is very problematic. First of all, feminism is a very ambiguous term. very ambiguous, it means different things to different people, right? Nobody can quite define it. There's conservative feminism. There's Christian feminism, there's liberal feminism, the socialist feminism, right? postmodern feminism, radical feminism, you know, those women female, or they call female, I think, you know, the ones who are saying we should have a * jihad. Right. So you have those feminists? I mean, are we do we identify with them? I don't think so. We have humanist feminists we have, you know, so feminism is not really defined, the feminists themselves don't know. And they
actually argue about which
things to fight for, and which things not to get go into write, they themselves don't have a consensus. So why would you want to label yourself with a term? And why would you want to assume a tie term that is so ambiguous, right? feminism is also unjust. And that's what we should be calling for justice. It's not about rights and, you know, trying to acquire more and more rights, and more and more this and more and more that no, it's about justice. We want men and women to have justice. It also ignores privileges that women have traditionally enjoyed. Like, for example, you know, the
women and children to be rescued first, as a kind of a law that's ingrained into society, right. So we're going to ignore that we're going to ignore the privileges that women enjoy, we're just going to always be paranoid and look for the things that are that we think are unequal.
He calls for favoring women. And we just gave an example of that 40%, minimum female quota on management boards. There are feminists who are fighting for women to not go to prison. Right? So they say that women are different to men. So by the way, whenever it suits feminists, they say women are different to men. And when it doesn't, you know, women and men are not different, they should be treated the same. So they say that there's a, there's a group of feminists who are saying, you know, they shouldn't have prisons for women, because women are in a different situation to men, we should just have these kind of open,
you know, secure housing for women to commit crimes, right?
So when it suits them, they take biology into account doesn't they don't.
Feminism is a reaction to a problem, right, that existed and exists in the West and in the world. But that problem needs not a plaster to be to be slapped on to it. It needs a holistic solution. Right? Because women don't exist in a vacuum. You can't just do you know, focus on women, and then the rest of society doesn't get affected.
It was a reaction to a specific problem and those wounds and wishes
Notice as Muslim women, those wounds were caused by not having guidance from God. That's the root of it, isn't it? When when human beings don't have guidance from God, they're stumbling in the dark, they're looking for the right way. And then they fall and they do all sorts of make all sorts of mistakes that oppress one another. So the solution to that is a holistic one. Not a man made one, not a woman made one, but a god given one.
Because a lot of kind of Allah He has the picture, as we say, and we have the pixel, right, we look at things we can see the the the.or the pixel, but Allah Subhana Allah, he has the picture. He knows what the bigger picture is. He has the objective understanding and view, right, we have a very subjective view.
feminist premises have been disproven, time and time again. Okay. And in fact, they go against human realities. For example, I'm just gonna give you three examples. One, we said, you know, feminists were saying in the second wave of feminism, that gender is a construct, right? They said, there's nothing biological about men and women that should inform their roles. But this is completely wrong.
Okay, because scientists, for example, in the book, The female brain, by Lou and Brian Dean, and I think should buy that book was really good, really helps you to see the difference between men and women.
In her book, The female brain, she says, scientists have documented an astonishing array of structural, chemical, genetic, hormonal and functional brain differences between men and women.
And
in his book,
why gender matters by Dr. Leonard Sachs, he says, and he actually called the 60s to the 90s, the Dark Ages, when it came to our knowledge of men and women, okay. And it's coincides with the second wave of feminism. He says, during the Dark Ages, that period from the mid 1960s, to the mid 1990s. It was politically incorrect to suggest that there were innate differences between girls and boys. And he says today, we we know that the innate differences between girls and boys are profound. Boys and girls do differ from one another in systematic ways that should be understood and made use of not covered up and ignored, right? That's just one example.
Another example is that they, they said, there's no such thing as a maternal instinct. That was a real big thing for the feminists during the 60s to 70s. There's no such thing as a maternal instinct. Women they just conditioned into, you know, because their dads and moms just give them dolls to play with. That's why they just, you know, when they get older, they start thinking, Oh, I need to have a baby. And there's no maternal instinct, we don't need children. And they don't need to have you know, they don't have any any connection with children. It's just something completely constructed.
In her book, The female brain by LouAnn Brizendine that I just mentioned, she has a whole chapter called the mommy brain, okay, which actually talks about how the brain of a woman changes, you know, the effect that it has when she holds a baby. That's not even her own baby, then the effect it has when she doesn't have the baby, how her brain completely changes. Right? So Pamela,
and now, you know, when they're saying breast is best, right? They're trying to reverse all of the stuff that feminists were fighting for before, which was that, oh, you can just leave your child just go back to work straight after you've had a child. You know, don't worry, there's no such thing as maternal instinct.
The the powdered milk is better for your child. Now they're doing a complete U turn. Right. And what happens when you go to the antenatal clinic, there's a big picture of a woman breastfeeding, right. soon as you walk in. And as soon as you give birth, the breastfeeding lady is round, having a chat with you trying to encourage you to breastfeed. So they did they did a complete U turn on that. Right.
They also said, you know, as part of that, you know, there's no paternalistic, they said, We should have 24 hour childcare. And I really fought for daycare for babies, right. And now what we're seeing is disaster.
In his book, the psychiatrist Peter Cook says in his book, early child care infants and nations are at risk. He says daycare is the greatest threat to our future mental health. Okay, we're talking about little babies, little children, you know.
And in his book, Steve Biddulph psychologist stupid off says
His book is raising babies. There's been a trebling in 20 years of the number of under threes in daycare. And then he says, an epidemic of mental health problems has taken place amongst children and adolescence in that time span.
I'd recommend you read that book as well, because we Muslim women are being affected by that now as well, right? sisters, they've just had a baby and they like, as soon as they can, they're trying to get back to work. Why would you do that? Why would you go through nine months, and then have that precious baby in front of you and then and then leave that child to somebody else? You know?
free love will free women. That was another mantra of the feminists, right? But what happened?
Has have women become more valued in society.
The whole kind of sexual revolution completely devalued women.
How many kids don't know who their fathers are?
How many men feel that they can just, you know, have a relationship with a woman and just leave her
home? How much has abortion gone up in society? Right? Cats barnyard use a feminist herself. In her book, the equality illusion. That's another book to read, by the way,
which is quite depressing, actually. She says today women's and girls bodies and she's talking today, right? are widely denigrated as inanimate objects to be publicly scrutinized, judged, maintained and manipulated for the benefit of others. They are shared public property, a female body is deemed an object that could be and should be made beautiful at almost any cost for the benefit of those looking at it.
So Pinilla they couldn't even respect you know, the, the the wife or the future Queen of England, right? Couldn't even respect her. It would take in photos of her when in her private situations at private settings, right. And then I remember just recently in the newspapers when she was holding her baby, and she was in New Zealand, right? They were criticizing her Oh, doesn't she look awkward? holding that baby. And then one of the journalists she was like, well, she is wearing high heels, you know, she, we want her to be like an all singing all dancing princess. And we want her to look after the baby as well, right? So look at the huge pressures on somebody like her to constantly look
good. To wear high heels. I'm telling you, the last thing you want to do when you've had a baby is wear high heels.
Everything hurts, you know?
So feminism has not led to the emancipation of women. Okay. In fact, it's it's shackled women even more. Now, they are oppressing themselves by their own choice, right? Because they've been conditioned to do that. The objectification of women has increased, lads minds. You know, * has become normal. Now. It's not even like a something that, you know, weird old men go and find in the top of the shelves, right? It's just normal. pneus everywhere.
68 million search engine requests every day for * take place. Right?
I was reading a sports magazine right in the gym. And I got to the middle page. And there was like a big there was a famous athlete, female athlete athlete in her underwear, right? I was thinking What is this, you know, this is supposed to be about sports. Okay. And in the interview, this athlete, she said, is quite sad. But I know that I'm not really going to get notice until I, you know, do modeling and I do this kind of stuff, right? So even though she was like a top athlete, in order to really be valued and notice, until she gets her kit off, basically, she's not gonna have any value. Right? And that's what the athletes have to do, don't they? It's not enough that they're excellent
at their sports and their game.
And the leveson inquiry recently into press into the press said that there is excessive objectification of women taking part in the press
taking place in the press and reducing them to entire reducing them entirely to sexual commodities. Okay, there's so many examples and
can somebody please tell me about time as well by the way, because I'm gonna lose track. Okay, so inshallah we're coming to the end. And there's so many examples. You know, abortion in the UK 200,000 babies a year are being aborted. Why are they being aborted? Right? It's all one nightstands, right? It's all people basically, not one
To take responsibility. And by the way,
over one and a half 1000 babies a year in the UK that are aborted, that are killed are over 22 weeks old, over 22 weeks old.
So there are there are parents who give birth prematurely to babies at that age who desperately try to keep them alive in incubators, right. And then on the other hand, you have
1001 and a half 1000 babies a year, over 22 weeks old, that's a fully formed baby, right?
being killed
eating disorders, you just got to read the book, by the way, the equality illusion, you know, and you'll see there's there's the situation of women has not improved. Yeah, they might have got gained one or two rights here and there, but there have been so many negative effects and counter effects of that. Feminism is materialistic. Yeah, Islam is not materialistic, because in Islam, we are thinking about the hereafter. Yes, I might not, you know, achieve certain things in this life. But if I have the Hereafter is my focus, I'll be I'll be successful. This is the vision of Islam.
So materialistic governments and corporations are, have been using feminism as well to exploit women. Okay. There's, you know, in governments, for example, they actually funded the second wave of feminism in America. Okay.
The, the editor of MS magazine in her in her biography, she actually says In her autobiography, she talks about how the CIA actually funded her kind of involvement in the, in the feminist movement, because and people who've analyzed it have said, it's because they wanted women to become taxpayers basically, wanted women to become taxpayers, and they want children to go into daycare early, because children who are institutionalized early, can be indoctrinated, right. They become easy to control in society.
But sisters, look at how even though the feminist movement has been going on for so many, you know, years and decades,
it couldn't even wipe out, for example, female infanticide in one country.
Okay, in the night, in the 1980s, a program for action was drawn up by the UN, okay, for women's rights. And this document was considered to be like the the the most advanced and the greatest document written for women's rights in history. Okay. But in the end, this document wasn't worth the paper was written on. Because in 1995, when the fourth UN World Conference on Women took place in Beijing, they couldn't even talk to the people who hosted the conference and say to them, look at the female infanticide that's going on in your country. Right? You know, China has got an epidemic of girls being killed,
either before birth or at birth, or being abandoned. They couldn't even say anything to even the host country. Right. So so the the the document wasn't even worth the paper it was written on and yet, look at the look at the ability of Islam to change nations. The Arabs, practice female infanticide, didn't they? Yeah, in fact, one of the companions of the Prophet sallallahu wasallam, he came to the Prophet salallahu alaihe salam, and he came and he confessed to him that he had killed before he became a Muslim. He had killed over 20 of his girl children. And he was asking whether allowed forgive him he was so sorry. Now he was asking well ever forgive me, this cinema.
This is how ingrained female infanticide was in that society. And yet, within 20 years of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam coming,
his practice that was so ingrained in society was completely wiped out of Arabia, right? completely wiped out came to an end.
This is just one example that shows practically, that Islam has the ability when it's implemented properly, and fully to make real change. So in conclusion, my sisters
In conclusion, Islam does not need feminism. Muslims do not need feminism, feminism, secularism, socialism, liberalism and any other ism you can think of. There may be some aspects of those isms that we agree with. Yes, we do care about the rights of women, of course.
We do. Yes, we do want the lads masks to be banned. Yes, we do care about the fact that you know, lap dancing clubs are springing up all over the place in London. We care about these things we care about many of the things that feminists care about. But just because you, you care about some aspects or just because you agree with some aspects, for example of capitalism, or some aspects of socialism, some aspects of feminism,
it doesn't mean you would now start calling yourself socialist or capitalist or feminist, right?
We don't need any other label, we need a return to Islam. This is what is really needed. The guidance of Allah to be implemented wholly and fully and completely.
To those who consider Islam to be misogynistic and patriarchal, we say you are wrong.
Take a closer look at Islam, in a holistic way, not in a reductionist with a reductionist approach. We have a creator, you have a creator, he gave us guidance, the guidance of the Creator is the best guidance, not the limited minds of human beings that keep changing their minds. We've just given so many examples of how feminists themselves changed their minds over over time, because they they realize they wrong
to those who believe that Islam has been misinterpreted, right, so to Muslims.
We say, you know, you're actually belittling female scholarship in Islam. You're belittling the fact that so many female scholars were involved in Islamic law and its formation by saying that it's, you know, the men are the ones who've had the influence on to it. No, that is, that's completely incorrect. You're saying also, you're being actually very sexist, because you're saying men are incapable of interpreting things justly?
That's completely sexist, isn't it? To say that men, if the prophets have a long way, Sonam was a man? And if if some male scholars were the ones who wrote a Tafseer of the Quran, for example, you're saying that they're completely incapable of being just just because they're men?
Yes, there might be quotes that you could bring up and say to us, look, look at chef so and so he said, this about women, this is really nasty. Or you might be able to bring some other quote and say this, this doesn't really fit in with the way the Prophet sallallahu Sallam talked about women.
But yes, because scholars are fallible, scholars are not infallible. There might be examples here and there of scholars who said certain things, or who held certain views that were
that we don't necessarily agree with what the other scholars didn't necessarily agree with. But to say that Islam has systematically been, you know, affected by this, to such an extent that verses of the Quran have been interpreted incorrectly, is the height of arrogance. Because first of all, you're saying that basically for 1400 years, people didn't know what these verses of the Quran meant, and literally told you has come along now and you know, the 21st century, and come to explain to people what these verses meant. The Sahaba didn't know what the verses meant, you know, the Hadith don't explain what the verses meant. And the scholars who, you know,
the vast majority of scholars, if they agreed on the second verse, they were wrong, but you know what the correct interpretation is, it's the height of arrogance. And Allah, Allah told us in the Quran, he said, I have revealed this Vicar and I will protect it, we're in Allahu Allah Hafiz on and part of the protection of the Quran is not just that its outward wording is going to be protected, not just that people will memorize it and that the actual copy of the Quran will be protected, but that its meaning will be protected. Right? So Allah subhanaw taala ensured that the meaning interpretation of the Quran would be protected as well. So by saying that it's been misinterpreted,
you are implying that the Quran is not preserved?
Are you going to change the meaning of the Quran every time society changes? Its views about something every time it makes you feel uneasy about something Are you going to keep changing the meaning of the Grand society is subjective.
Allah subhanaw taala has the has the overall picture, a lot of how Allah knows objectively what the right way is for men and for women. The real problem that such people have is actually a submission problem.
You have a problem, you cannot submit to the verses of Allah, you cannot submit to Allah as guidance. So I would invite such people to enter into Islam completely.
As one brother said, You know, sometimes when converts or even people who start practicing Islam later on in life, when they come back to Islam,
they don't come back to it as you know.
They've completely embraced it. They're like tourists, right? So they like Islam.
And when they enter Islam, they're like, well, I don't like this bit. So I'll try and change that. Let's campaign to change that. Right? They're bringing their former tastes and their former way of life, into Islam with them, right? Now, either you've got to embrace Islam completely, okay? Or it's gonna cause problems for you.
To those who care about women's rights, yes, that is suffering. It's not just women who are suffering at the moment, you know, the rights of men are not being fulfilled the Egyptian revolution, how did it start? It was a man right, who set himself on fire because he couldn't, he couldn't earn enough to feed his family, right? Men are oppressed as well as women. So it's unfair to say that women are the only ones who are being oppressed in the world today, we should be just we should care about the rights of both men and women, human beings stand for justice, not just for women.
We have a different history. We don't need to assume this label. And we don't need to assume these isms. We have a different history.
Two brothers and two men who oppress women, we should say, Come back to the way of the Prophet sallallahu wasallam come back to Islam.
As the Prophet salallahu alaihe salam said, it took a life in this fear Allah with regards to women For verily you have taken them as a trust from Allah.
To brothers, we say don't be unjust, if sisters bring legitimate, you know, issues that they have legitimate complaints that they have, then think about them, talk to them, let's have some dialogue, try to understand why they have the grievances that they have.
And to my sisters, don't allow this prevailing kind of atmosphere to affect you. Okay. Don't think that by you not being in the, as they say, the front line, okay, not being the face of the Dow if you like, Don't think that you are any less valuable?
You know, the women at the time of the Prophet, they didn't go on jihad. No, they didn't. When people bring these examples of Oh, so and so and so and so went on jihad, oh, the women would go if they would need it, right. So if what the men are doing is enough, okay, in a particular area, then we as women don't, shouldn't feel that we definitely have to take part in exactly the same things as the men. This is a very,
this is not an Islamic way of looking at it. As we said, we will get equal reward if we just support the men as well. Yeah, we have our own things to be focusing on we have our own means of doing our we have our own means of doing things, we don't have to do them in exactly the same way that the men do them. And so my sisters, our message really should be to women all over the world.
That if you want more than what feminism has given you, and what society has given you, if you want to reach your full feminine potential, if you want to experience true womanhood, the way God your Creator intended it for you. And if you want to experience freedom, okay, the freedom that human beings can enjoy, which is freedom from the shackles of society, freedom from the shackles of your own desires, from living a base life, that's just chasing desires, and freedom from all these industries that are trying to manipulate and affect you.
Then you don't need any ism. What you need is God's guidance. And so we should be inviting those people and I invite all of you, my sisters, to embrace no of Islam but Islam
and work hard to encourage enjoying the good and forbid the evil and re establish Islam in our own lives and the lives of society. This is the way women and men will attain justice inshallah, and that children will not suffer in the process. subhanak Allahumma will become the shadow lala land