What is Hijab in Islam?

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winter Stein who went to stuff when I wouldn't be let him into rotary and fusina women say you sejati at Molina my yeah the Hila fella mobile Allah wanna use lil fella had the Allah wa shadow Allah ilaha illallah wa the hula Cherie color, wash hadoo, Anna, Mohammed and Abu do who are a solo. Indeed All praise is due to Allah, we praise Him, we seek His help we seek his forgiveness, we seek protection and Allah from the evil of ourselves and from the evil consequences of our actions. Whomsoever Allah guides, none can misguide. And whomsoever Allah leaves astray, none can 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 was His servant and Messenger will be surely Saudi were silly. I'm worried of the terminal discerning of oh,

dear sisters, As Salam aleikum wa rahmatullah wa barakato.

And thank you for inviting me to slough. I was just reflecting on the way here on the fact that

about 30, something years ago, in 1978, when my parents were actually planning to come to this country, and they're from India, and they told their relatives that, you know, my, my father had been invited here, to get involved with an Islamic organization, in order to Charlie do Dawa in this country, and to bring good to the Muslim community. When my mom told her family about this, the first thing they said to her is, you know, they started tattooing, and they started shaking their heads, and they were like,

That's it, then, when we see your next you won't be wearing hijab anymore. You, you know, some bada Hatami, jagah, you know, everything is just going to be finished, you're going to be on crazy, you know, you're gonna be completely westernized. Now, that's it. And my mom said she was so upset, you know, by this

accusation or assumption from some of her relatives? Because she said, is that how weak you think I am? Do you really think I'm that weak that I'm gonna go to this place, and just because of, it's not common in this place to wear hijab. And because Islam is a strange thing in this country, and you have to appreciate, you know, in the 70s, the way the people from the Indian subcontinent post colonial times, thought of the British, they really had a kind of an offer for the British. And, you know, she was really upset. And she said, You wait and see. That's what she said to them. You wait and see and see, when my children grow up. They're going to be examples, which are. So to Pamela. At

that time, in the 70s. I don't remember the 70s. But the 80s. Growing up in the UK, I was always the only one wearing hijab at school, right? Only one in secondary school, who was observing hijab, you can see my school photo of the whole school. Yeah, it's 180 Girls, and you can just see me, you just look at it, you can spot me straightaway, because I'm the only one wearing of the white hijab, and everyone else is obviously not. That's what it was, like, you know, back that was in the 90s Secondary School. I mean, it was really strange, to cover your hair to be seen as a Muslim. But now look at the effect and the kind of impact that hijab is having. It's not really hijab, it's the

Muslim woman is having in Europe,

such a huge impact that governments are afraid of her. Governments are afraid of this hijab that she this piece of cloth that she wears on her head, right?

Or that she wears to cover her face.

So Subhan Allah Alhamdulillah we are in a situation now where

although a sister who may be thinking about wearing hijab, she may have some personal obstacles, etc. However, one of those obstacles is not that a job is a strange thing. Do you see back in those days, it was much harder. You really were the odd one out you definitely would be bullied. You definitely would be somebody would say something to you, right? But now Hamdulillah you know, it's something common, something very common. So

with that, thought I will begin in sha Allah.

Allah

I want us to just kind of reflect a little bit on what it was like at the time of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. So for many, many years, the hijab as we know it, and when I talk about hijab,

the word hijab has come to kind of mean, okay, and it doesn't mean this strictly in the Quran, because when in the Quran when hijab is mentioned, it's usually mentioned as a screen, right as a screen. So the wives of the Prophet salallahu, Alaihe, salam, they would have a screen right, or they would have their veils or they would cover their faces. So in the Quran, it's usually used to mention to denote some kind of a screen. However, when we talk about hijab, we're talking about the covering of a Muslim woman when she's in public, right, or the dress of a Muslim woman when she's in the presence of men who are not.

So what is a little bit of history with the hijab, especially from the time of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam. If we go really way back before the prophets of Allah when he was salam, there's an ayah, in the Quran, in which Allah refers to the first Jamelia. He says to the wives of the Prophet, salallahu, alayhi wasallam, that, stay quiet Stay in your homes, and do not make a dazzling display of yourself the way that people did, or the way that was done in the first Jahai. Leah, and in the Tafseer of this ayah. If you look in Tafseer, of Ibn katheer, he talks about the opinion of evil Abbas not the alarm, who, who is the professor of Quran, who is you know, he was an

exegesis and explain of the Quran.

And he said that, after all, between the Prophet Noah and the Prophet Idris, there were some generations of the children of Adam, and some of them lived up high in the mountains, and others lived very low on the flat lands. Okay. And what happened was an it's quite, it's quite a kind of long story. But essentially, what happened was that Shavon came to them. And he convinced the people who lived on the flatland over time to start having these parties, okay, once a year, they would have this party in which,

although the women would normally be covered, you know, in the presence of men who were not related to them, on this one day, they would remove their jobs. And they would have this party when which they would really adorn themselves really make themselves beautiful. And the men would do the same, the men would really dress up as well, I don't know how they did that. But anyway, they did. And, and then they would have this party, right, whatever happens at a party.

And then Shavon, went to the people of the mountains.

And he kind of told them about this party that was going on. And the people of the mountains, the men of the mountains, they snuck into this the land of the people of the flat plains. And they kind of looked into this party, and they saw that, wow, you know, they're having this party. And they saw the women of the people who lived in the flat plains, and they were known as women of extraordinary beauty. And so then, basically, over time, Shavon convinced them to do this every year, and for the two

types of people to intermingle. And over time, evil and for wash for wash, meaning, you know, adultery, fornication, started to become prevalent, and before that, it had not been prevalent amongst the children of Adam. So this is why Allah subhanaw taala says, Do not make a dazzling display of yourself in the way that was done in the first Jahai Lea, Allah described that as the first jar Helia, the first time that ignorance was part of expressed on Earth, and you see how Chevron worked.

He didn't come to people and say to them, commit Zina straightaway. Okay. And he doesn't do that to people. He doesn't say to people, you know, have a boyfriend get have a relationship straightaway, doesn't do that. That's not how Cheban works. He knows that you as Muslim, are much too strong for that. Right? So what he does is he does things one step at a time. And he's very, very patient, very patient, he will make you lose your standards just a little bit. Then after a while, he'll make you lose your standards that bit more. And then he'll keep going and keep going and he's so patient, you won't even realize it.

And you'll let your standard slip until people

We'll even fall into the unthinkable. And the chef that was mentioning this to us, he said, Do you think it happened overnight, it doesn't happen overnight, slowly, but surely, you know, a person loses their principles in one matter, then another matter, then another matter, then maybe they start spending time with somebody who they shouldn't in private, and then something else happens. And then something else happens, you know,

this is how Shavon works. And we have to realize he's our enemy. And he knows the power of the Muslim woman. In fact,

even those who would wish us harm the enemies of Islam, Islamophobes, or the people who are against Islam and would like to see Islam

be destroyed from within, they know the power of Muslim woman more than sometimes we know our own power.

And let me give you an example of that.

Because during colonial times, there's an author called Franz Fanon, and he was a philosopher in post colonialism. And he wrote the book. And there's a chapter in the book called Algeria unveiled. And he talked about what the French governmental strategy was in Algeria in order to conquer Algeria, and completely remove Islam from the fabric of their society. Okay, this was their aim and their goal. And what they did was, he said, this is this was this sums up the policy that they had, they said, if we want to destroy the structure of Algerian society, its capacity for resistance, we must first of all, conquer the women,

we must go and find them behind the veil, where they hide themselves, and in the houses where the men keep them out of sight. Okay, and Franz Fanon goes on to say, every rejected veil, disclosed to the eyes of the colonialists, horizons, until then forbidden and revealed to them piece by peace, the flesh of Algeria laid bare every veil that fell, every body that became liberated from the traditional embrace of the hype, and the the Islamic veil, every face that offered itself to the bold and impatient glance of the occupier was a negative expression of the fact that Algeria was beginning to deny herself and was accepting the rape of the colonizer.

So

believe it or not, it was actually French colonialists policy to focus on the women, because the way they saw it, if we can get these women

to remove their veils, we've come one step closer to them, then leaving their culture, leaving the whole kind of Islamic culture and questioning everything else, right. And if we can get them to do that, then we can help them to influence the next generation of men and women, because women are, you know, the cliche, quote goes, you know, women are half of society, and they give birth to the other half, right? So they realize that if we focus on the women, we can just change the whole of the society in the quickest, possible way. So even the enemies of Islam, even Trayvon knows the power of the Muslim woman. And that's why even in our times, we see so much focus on the Muslim

woman. But why are we going to ever understand because we want to liberate these women? Look at poor Malala. Right, and these barbaric brown people, they just don't let their women be educated. Just yesterday, there was this whole article in The Independent about the kind of statistics for rape in in Asia, thinking in Asia, what about the statistics in the West? Why are you focusing so much on

other than the West? Why is it always so much focus on other than the West? Because they know that Ali, focusing on women, and getting women to be angry, getting women to take on certain ideologies can have a huge effect

in changing the society and in people leaving Islam.

So realize that our own power, we must realize our own power. So that was

we summarized what happened in the January to Lula now at the time of the Prophet salallahu Alaihe Salam, for the whole of the Muslim period. And most of all, much of the muddiman period, the covering for Muslim women had not been revealed. Yet, so it wasn't something that was a command from Allah. And as I showed her the law and has said, she said, you know, the Quran, it came down bit by bit, and the message of Islam came down bit by bit, first of all, Allah Subhana Allah

I told people about himself, he taught people about himself and when people loved him, when people had Iman, then only then did Allah subhanaw taala tell them to stop committing fornication, stop drinking alcohol, stop doing this and stop doing that. And she said, if if Allah subhanaw taala had told them right from the beginning, stop drinking alcohol stop gambling, and then they would have said, we will never stop doing this. We can never give this up. Right? But the way Allah subhanaw taala gave tarbiyah to the Sahaba was in stages. And so it was in Medina that the verses of the Quran were revealed about the hijab, and I'm going to mention two of the most prominent verses of

the Quran that talk about Hijab

so Allah Subhana Allah said, what will be learned him in a shape on a regime? We're calling me naughty? Yeah, I don't mean Abbasali hidden away. Furuya wala you Medina Zilla Tahuna Illa Amina while you're gonna be humare hymnology you will be Hiner wala you Medina Xena. Tahuna in Malibu Latina. Oh hinda Oh, Abba Ebola Tiana. Oh, a banana even. Oh, a banana Ebola t 101. Hannah. Oh bunny f1 hinda Oh bunny a hottie hidden hinda only said you can Oh my God. Amen. Hoonah Oh with Benina Wally only invited me originally. Oh with briefly Lavina lamb Johan. Wala out in the sir. Wala your Blue Ribbon ABBY Oh, Julie Hilda Leo, lemme ma you feel Amin Xena, Tina. What do you know Allah Who

Jimmy and a un manana La La comme tu freehold. So in this, I have the Quran in surah to Nora. I have number 31 100 Allah says directly to the Prophet salallahu alayhi wa sallam and to the Muslim men. He's addressing them. He says tell the believing women to lower their gaze. And this is after Allah tells the believing men to lower their gaze. So first, Allah subhanaw taala tells the men to lower the gaze. And then he says tell the believing women to lower their gazes and protect their

private parts and not to show off their adornments the Xena except only that which is apparent, okay. And to draw their veils Kumari henna Femara is something that you wear on your head to draw their femurs over their bosoms or their bodies and not to reveal their adornments except to their husbands, or their fathers or their husbands fathers, or their sons or their husbands sons, or their brothers, or their brothers sons, or their sisters, sons or their Muslim women. In other words, other

other women, or the female slaves whom their right hands possess, or old men servants who like vigor, or small children who have no sense of the nakedness of women, and let them not stomp their feet so as to reveal what they hide of their adornment and all of your bed Allah to forgive you all or believers that you may be successful.

Okay. And then in another ayat of the Quran, Allah subhanaw taala says, Yeah, you had an equally as well. Jika webinar Tikka when he said, minion, you the Nina la hinami Angela Bibi Hidden Valley gardener and you are off now fella, you then what can Allahu wa for Rahima and this is in sort of ZURB verse 59. So Allah subhanaw taala says, oh, Prophet, tell your wives and your daughters, um, the women of the believers to draw their cloaks. Okay, and the word used is

you Dineen, Allah hindlimb Angelababy Hannah

Jollibee Yes, to draw their outer garments over their bodies that will be better, so that they will be known and not

annoyed or not molested. And Allah is Ever oft Forgiving and most Merciful. So these are the kind of two of the primary verses that the scholars of Islam point to when it comes to talking about the cover, or the dress of the Muslim woman when she is in the presence of men who are not Muslims. Now.

What was the reaction of the Sahaba

At what was the reaction of the companions of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, when they heard these verses, now he shouted Blanca she talks about them. And she says, one of the,

somebody in her presence mentioned, the woman of Quraysh, right, which was the tribe of Aisha Delana and the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and their virtues. And I showed her the law on her. She said, the women of Qureshi are good. But by Allah, I've never seen any women better than the women of the unsolved, unsolved with the people of Medina,

or any who believed the book of Allah more strongly or had more faith in the Revelation. When Surah, two more was revealed, telling them to draw the veils over their bodies.

Their menfolk came to them, and recited to them what had been revealed, and there was not one woman amongst them, who did not go and take her curtain, you know, or some cloth from her house. And the following morning, they prayed wrapped up, as if they were crows on their heads. This is the way that I showed them. How the Allahu anha described it. I mean, there was an immediate acceptance SubhanAllah. But these are the words of Allah, the Creator, the one who made me, he is the one who gave me my beauty. He is the one who gave me the, the hair, the body that I'm so proud of. And that that I find so, you know, I know that is so beautiful. He's the one who gave me that. And Allah Who

knows me better than I know myself, myself and loves me more than my parents. He is the one who's saying to me, do this.

It's for my own good. How can I do anything but obey? You know, this was the kind of attitude of the Sahaba And subhanAllah. And there's also a story or a narration about actually the law. And one day when she saw a lady who was wearing, she was a Christian lady who was really dressed in all her finery, and, you know, going out, etc. And I saw her and,

you know, I'm sure sisters here who, you know, what if you if you just started wearing hijab, or

sometimes when you do see somebody who's really dressed up,

there is a type of a fitna that can take place, there's a type of thing that a thought that can enter your mind that I can look as good as that. I could do that as well. If you wanted, you could write, but look what I should have the Lana said she, she obviously felt something as well. And she said, in the presence of the people who were with her, she said, enjoy it while while you can. That's what she said. She said, enjoy it while you can. Because it's for you in this life. And it's for us in the ACA, right? Because in Jana, nobody's gonna let you jump, right? There's there are no negative lusts and desires in Jana. So everyone will be free to dress as they want. And of course,

you know, as women of Jana, the women in this life who earn Jana, or who Allah subhana, Allah gives gender to out of His mercy.

They will have a reward like no one else, because Subhanallah the hardship that they went through everything that they went through, you know, even the horror lane, they don't have the status that the women of Jannah of this world have, because they would create it for Jana. But the women of this world who go to Jana

went through all the hardships, right? They went through the struggles, they had the server when everything around them was telling them not to obey Allah. So they will have a much higher status than the than even the whole end in Jannah.

So this was the reaction of the Sahaba yet.

Now, let's talk about what a job is and what a job isn't. Okay, just to be clear, and by the way, I don't want anyone in this room, you know, whether you're wearing a job or not, whatever stage you're at, I don't want anyone to feel you know that this is a talk that's attacking you or criticizing you. It's not like that. We're all sisters, aren't we? We're all Sisters in Islam. We've all been through different phases, if you saw me where I was in a teenager, right? Even though I grew up in a religious family, if you saw me you'd be like, Oh, no, she is this Fatima work of Allah. Okay. You know, I used to wear jeans. I used to wear a very small flowery job and whatever, right? I went

through different phases as well. Or I would say went through a journey.

Right, we've been through a journey sometimes right? And everyone goes through a journey. So we're all here to help each other on that journey. Nobody's here to judge anyone else. And one of the points that I'm going to make in my, in the points that I'm about to make is the hijab automatically does not make you a pious person. Just as not wearing hijab doesn't automatically make you an in pious person, right? You have to get that out of our minds. Because each of us have a struggle, don't we?

What about backbiting? Isn't the backbiting a major sin? Right Backbiting is actually worse, could be worse than not wearing hijab, right?

But how many of us who wear hijab fall into backbiting?

And there could be a sister who doesn't wear hijab, and she doesn't back by?

Well, she has better the other better loveliness, right? So both of them are things that so Backbiting is something that was forbidden, hijab is something Allah has commanded us with. So both of those are things that people struggle with, right? So none of us are here to kind of judge each other. We're here to help each other to share advice, because the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam told us that this deen is all about advice, advising each other. And he said, If you don't, when you stop, enjoying the good and forbidding the evil, that's when destruction will fall upon you, as a nation, when you stop enjoying the good and forbidding the evil. So we could all just sit

quietly, and you know, not talk about Hijab not talk about some of the problems that are happening in our communities related to hijab. But then we wouldn't be enjoying the good and forbidding the evil.

So I just want to make that really clear to everybody. So what is hijab? And what isn't hijab?

Hijab is an act of obedience to Allah. That's the thing that we've got to get into our heads. It's not just about identity. It's not just a symbol. You know, like in France, they banned religious symbols. So they're banned across the band, other things that are seen as symbols, well, the hijab is not just a symbol. It's not just me saying I'm a Muslim. Yes, it has that effect. Right? Everyone knows a Muslim woman, and they see her, right. And that's why insha Allah subhanaw taala will give the Muslim woman reward that the Muslim men won't get, because they can easily meld into society, they can easily blend in, nobody will look twice, however, as a Muslim woman, right from the

beginning, you know, right from the time when we reach puberty, we stand out, right? If we observe hijab, and of course, any one who has to do any command of Allah, and has to do it in a more difficult setting, will get more reward for that. So we shouldn't feel you know, that, Oh, we're living in Britain, and so hard sometimes, etc, we should realize we're gonna get more reward in Sharla, for doing the same things that assistant might be doing in Saudi Arabia system might be doing in Egypt or elsewhere, where Islam is normal, and hijab is normal, we will be getting much more reward in this land. So don't underestimate the blessing. Actually, the blessing that Allah has

given us of being here in this land, and going through the hardships when we wake up on the piano, we will not regret that we will be glad that Allah subhanaw taala made it hard for us and that we overcame that challenge, because of the great reward that we will get in sha Allah. So Allah subhanaw taala, we said knows us better than we know ourselves. When we decide to observe a job, we are obeying Him,

because He cares about us, he told us to do that we belong to him, right? Who are we to question something, but He commands us to do some of the things He commands us to do? We can understand. Some of them we can't fully understand. So for example, why is it that porque is haram? We can't really 100% say one way or another because if somebody said okay is unclean, and somebody can say okay, well what if we sanitize it and clean it and you know, really make it really clean and pure? Can you have it then? We'll say no. So we can't really say exactly why. Certain things Allah commanded he did come on, and why he forbade certain things we don't really know everything. However, sometimes

you can see the wisdoms behind things. Our job is simply to to ascertain, is this a command from my Creator or not? Once you've ascertained This is a command. Then our job is to say, I listen and I obey. That's the attitude that we've got to have, right? I listen and I obey.

Okay.

So

just as we don't display our pin numbers, just as we don't display our jewels, you know, I've got a cleaner when she comes, I hide my stuff, you know, I admit it, I hide it, because I can't really 100% Be sure that something might not tempt her, you know, she's an immigrant. And you know, she's from a very simple background. So

I hide things. Why do I do that? Because when you have precious things, you don't want them to be exposed. When you have something precious, you don't want anyone to steal it, you don't want anyone to take anything away from it. Right? And similarly, Allah Subhana Allah, Allah is telling us that we are precious. This is the simple message that Allah is giving us. In fact, in the ayat that I've just read to you, the feeling that I get is Allah cares about so much. He says, Tell them to dress in this way, so that they won't be harmed so that they won't be looked at in the wrong way, by people. Right? Why would Allah say that to us, except if he really cared about us. This is the one

who's talking to us, our Creator, the one who gave us life who loves us so much. He cared about us enough to tell us simple things that will benefit us and protect us.

Hijab is not, as I said, just a religious symbol. Right? It does give a message, but it's not the same as across, it's not as simple like that. It's not as simple as that to kind of discard or leave. It is a command. And it's also not enough for a person to say, well, you know, Islam is in my heart.

You know, Allah doesn't really care about the way we look. And I've heard some people they use the ayah in the Quran, in which Allah says, Allah does not look at your bodies, your outward appearances, he looks at your taqwa, right? It looks at what's in your heart. Now, that's the wrong understanding of that verse. Right? Because Allah subhanaw taala. It's true that what's inside us is very important. And the most important is that we believe inside. However, there is no emaan without actions, our actions and the way we look, the way we come forward the way we present ourselves, whether we pray or not, whether we foster or not those actions, but they are a manifestation of

what's inside, aren't they, they show you what's inside.

If a person doesn't show anything on the outside, they're not doing any actions, then that's a sign that of something that's wrong inside, right? Or it could be so we have to be aware that that's not a correct way of looking at it. No. If you want to be close to Allah, if you want to obey Allah, it will manifest itself on the outside and it should.

Hijab is about covering certain areas of the body, so just like salah, or similar to Salah, you can't just say, right, I'm gonna I want to pray to Allah, so I'll just pray the way I want to pray.

It's not like that. Or, you know, I'll just fast the times that I want to fast. It doesn't work like that. Allah Subhana Allah, Allah has given us certain parameters. However, they're not so rigid. The parameters of the job are not so rigid when it comes to culture, cultural difference. What do I mean by that? So ALLAH SubhanA, Allah has told us all the Prophet sallallahu alayhi, Salam told us that the bare minimum that we should expose when we're in the presence of men who are not related to us, is our face and our hands, right?

So we cover everything except our face and our hands.

That includes covering the head and hair and is right and the neck as well. And whatever we wear on our head should extend over our chest. Okay, that's what the Tafseer of the idea is.

While you're Riblah Bihu Marie hymnology Ruby henna, okay, do you begin now means this area, so they should cover this area with whatever is on their heads, okay.

One of the other conditions of hijab is that it should be loose, and that it should be opaque.

Okay, meaning not see through, should not be see through

all also that it doesn't show the shape of our bodies. Because the Prophet salallahu alayhi salam told us towards the end of time there would be women who are clothed but naked, they clothed but naked. And it really feels like in our times, you can see that no, because when you've got these very tight types of clothes now that leave nothing to the imagination. It's just like a person just painted their body right. Or you see

like the Oscars, and you see the dresses are all like see through literally transparency through clothes, which you could just see their whole bodies we can see, you know, this prophecy of the Prophet salallahu Alaihe Salam seems to be coming true in our times. And also that thing that we're wearing shouldn't shape the show the shape of the body, okay? And it should not be an adornment in and of itself.

Because Allah says cover your Xena, Xena means beautiful things, it can also mean parts of our body right? Now, if you make your hijab into a Xena in itself, that is defeating the purpose of it. Unfortunately, in our times, you go to the shops and it's really hard to find a buyers or clothes that are not very heavily beautified with lots and lots of bling right all over them. It's really hard. But if if we changed our approach, and if we started requesting, you know, things that will play things that were more simple, then of course, the shops would have to satisfy our our demands, right? The demands of the customers. But unfortunately, at the moment, everyone is just happy with,

you know, just to find very, very overly decorated

buyers and clothes, right, which are labeled as hijab.

So that kind of defeats the purpose of it. Again, it kind of defeats the purpose if you're wearing very, very tight clothes, and your work covering your hair. Because, you know, your body is supposed to be covered as well, your body is can be attractive as well and more attractive than your hair, right? So we have to be careful that whatever stage we're at, we should be aspiring to be able to fulfill all of the conditions of a job, and not just stay at the stage that you're at. Yeah, like I said, we're all on the journey. However, we shouldn't become stagnant. Keep moving towards Allah.

But there is cultural leeway. And what I mean by that is that the way that women dress in Saudi is not necessarily the way that everyone has to dress, right. And we know that in Afghanistan, people dress differently with a woman, the hijab in Pakistan is different, the hijab in Afghanistan is different, the hijab in Malaysia is different. However, the general parameters are the same, right? Cover everything should be loose, it should not be very, very showy should be you know, simple.

And it should not be see through, and whatever wearing on our head should be extended.

Hijab is not just a head dress. That's quite an important one. Because nowadays, what you're seeing is, although it's really wonderful, and heartening to see more and more sisters, observing each other wanting to observe hijab, it is almost becoming like a headdress. You know, in the minds of many, especially young people, because I see these YouTube channels where, you know, these girls are helping people to find, be confident, right, whether he jumps, however, you know, sometimes they got over the limits. And that is when they start really encouraging you to be to turn it into, like a fashion thing, right? And to really beautify it with poles and necklaces and all that kind of thing.

That's, that's defeating the whole purpose, or wearing heavy makeup with it. Right? I met a police officer, a female police officer, and she attended a talk in which we were talking about what is her job? What is What are the benefits of your job, and what are the parameters of your job? And she said, Well, I really, it's just clicked with me for the first time because I was always really confused because I always saw Muslim woman wearing very tight clothes or wearing very heavy makeup or so I just didn't get what the point of hijab was, right. So when we do that, what we do is we confuse people, we confuse people they think, okay, you know, she's got everything else out, but her

hair, you know, so it doesn't really make sense to them.

For hijab is not merely a headdress, observing hijab will help you to become closer to Allah. Of course because

anything you do, to obey Allah brings you closer to Allah, Allah Subhana Allah Allah said in a hadith could see, which is a Hadith in which the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam conveys to us something that Allah said, but not word for word in Allah's words, but in his own words. The Prophet sallallahu alayhi salam told us that

Allah says that there's nothing

through which we become closer to Allah we draw closer to Him. Then the obligation

It's so anything that Allah has made obligatory on us. By doing those, that's the first step to becoming closer to Allah, then doing the extra x. And then we become so close to Allah that we, you know that Allah is always looking out for us. And we know that throughout history women associated with a lot with, you know, women of God, if you like women of piety have always dressed modestly. They've always, they're always portrayed like that. And there's a reason for that. Right? So whenever you see an image of Mary, it's like somebody said, you know, if Mary came down, Maria Maria has Salam, if Mary came down in our times, who are the women who she would think, are her people?

Who are the people who should think are her people, it will be the Muslims, right? It will be the Muslim women, because definitely, she being like a very pious person and being a woman who is living in the masjid of that time.

You know, dressed very modestly, and even until today, the images of Mary are basically like a Muslim woman.

So hijab, although hijab helps us to feel closer to Allah, because it kind of removes a certain level of vanity, a certain level of a sense of vanity that is in all of us, right? It stops us from going over the top when it comes to that vanity. Because we know that look, Allah subhanaw, Taala has commanded us not to use the beauty that He's given us in the incorrect way. And every woman knows how to use her beauty, to get far with a man or to do things that she shouldn't do. Every woman knows, deep down how to do that, right?

But the difference is that the Muslim woman when she looks in the mirror, when she before she goes out, her question isn't? Am I looking really hard? Or whatever? The question she should be asking herself is, would Allah be pleased with the way I'm dressed?

Because Allah has given me permission to go out. But he's given me certain rules to go out with.

If I follow those rules, then I'm allowed to go out, actually, if you want to look at it like that.

But observing hijab doesn't make you pious by default. So if you're shouting and swearing, or if you're treating people really badly, I got on a bus the other day in East London, and this sister was literally effing and blinding with and she was like, dressed all in black. And I was like, Oh, my goodness, Hannah, like she has like, she doesn't realize how, how bad it looks, you know, looks really, really bad, especially coming from a Muslim woman. And in that way, it makes you closer to Allah as well. Because because, you know, you look like a Muslim. It makes you kind of think, right? Should I really be doing that? Should I really be saying that? How should I be in this situation,

because people are looking at you as a Muslim, it makes you more self aware.

However, if you're going to just think of hijab as an outward thing, and you're still going to go and hang out with boys, and you're still going to chat with them. And you're still going to do this and that,

then that defeats the purpose of the hijab. It's both inner and outer. Yeah, we look at everything in Islam holistically. It's not just on the outside, and it's not just on the inside. It's both. So our behavior has to match. You know, the outward. When we're talking to people, we talk in a in a medium voice. We don't intermingle with men freely, meaning that we're making certain types of friendships, etc, with men, right? And we keep a respectful distance.

And our manners and our behavior should reflect the manners of behavior are Muslim, of course, hijab protects us because it protects us, as I said, from our own excessive vanity.

It protects us from the glances of men

from the male gaze. And this is like a whole subject that studied at university, the male gaze, and how, you know, movies and television, and even newspapers, everything is geared around the male gaze, how a male would perceive it, what would be exciting to a man, right? How a man looks at women.

And so you kind of become free from that.

Okay? And it also makes us kind of distance ourselves from what society thinks everyone should be doing. Because as Muslims, we are leaders, we're supposed to be the leaders. We're not supposed to be sheep, who are merely following the crowd merely following the fashion. That's not to say that we deny ourselves completely know. As Muslims we were completely free to buy the clothes that we want to, to really enjoy fashion to really enjoy

Boy, culture, jewelry, everything, we can enjoy all of that. But Allah tells us where is appropriate to enjoy that and where it's not appropriate to enjoy that right behind closed doors, with women, with our families, and the men who are Muslims, were completely free and we should dress up, we should have parties for girls, so that they can dress up because that is assigned to them that they want to express. So we should satisfy that, but in the halal way.

If you really look at what feminists of today are saying, right, you'll see that even they are saying, even though in the 60s and 70s, there was the sexual revolution, which was basically what they considered to be women, freeing themselves from the shackles of men, women freeing themselves from the shackles of marriage, of society's expectations, etc, etc, etc. What was really happening was that actually, men were being given license to do what they want, with their desires without being accountable for it.

Because what is marriage, when a woman who's getting married, she's giving the message to a man, that if you want to be close to me, then you have to commit to me, you can't just use me and discard me. You can't just live without the consequences of intimacy with Me. Whereas I have to live with the consequences, right? If a woman becomes pregnant, she has children, she lives with the consequences. And that's exactly what's what happened. And now when we listen to the news, we're hearing about Jimmy Savile, and all of these, these nasty stuff that's coming out from the 60s and 70s and 80s. Right, which was the time of the so called Sexual Revolution.

And that's the reality of what was happening to girls and women, they were being exploited, they will be expected to just do whatever men want, because now, there wasn't that expectation on them to wait till they're married. Right? They're supposed to just go along with stuff. And there's some really powerful articles that have been written about this by girls from that time, who say that it was actually not a fun time at all, it was soul destroying, because everybody expected girls to behave differently now, everybody expected them to say yes to any man that comes along, because you're that they're free now, apparently. And they were sold this lie that this is all your choice.

But in reality, they were being manipulated.

And feminist character barnyard, she talks about this. And she says, and she's written this book,

The equality illusion, which I would really recommend that we read so that we know what's going on in society.

She says that today and this is a book written recently. Today, women's and girls bodies 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 and should be made beautiful at almost any cost, for the benefit of those looking at it. And even, you know, the mothers of feminism people like Germaine Greer, recently in a BBC TV documentary, she said, liberation hasn't happened. Even sexual liberation didn't happen. What happened was that commercial pornography was liberated, Fantasy was liberated, but people weren't liberated. And she even said that things have gotten a lot worse for women since I wrote my book The Female Eunuch, right?

So even feminists are saying, actually all that freedom stuff for you love and you know, a woman's body belongs to her and all of that, it didn't actually have a positive effect at all. In fact, in many ways, things have gotten much, much worse for women.

And what really makes me angry actually, is that in order to cover up the negative things that are happening to women in this society, what the media does is it focuses on the women of the brown people. That's the only way I can put it, you know, women in black people's countries and brown people's countries. Let's focus on them. Let's make our women think that it's only black men and brown men and Muslim men. They're the ones who oppress the women, not us. Right? When in reality, look what's happening in this country.

According to feminist charity rape crisis, 85,000 women are raped on average in England and Wales every year.

85,000 and this is supposed to be the society that is trying to

I'm trying to really export

this way of life to every country abroad.

Now, then we really in this country, we need to focus on ourselves. We need to focus internally on the things that are happening 400,000 women are sexually assaulted each year

in Britain.

And they say that, you know, so many of them don't even report it.

One in five women has experienced some sort of sexual violence since the age of 16.

So Pamela, so you see, Allah subhanaw. Taala knows us, he knows the way men and women are, he knows the way society will suffer and be affected when he gives us the laws that he gives us.

He job benefits society, because it removes the sexual tension from the public space. So ALLAH SubhanA, Allah is telling us, there is a place for the intimacy of the relationship between men and women to be enjoyed to be celebrated, there is a place for that there is a context for that. However, in the public space, let's make the public space really healthy and really free, so that there's no kind of sexual tension in that space so that men and women can work together without any problems arising. And you know, it really is a form of sexual harassment when women think that they can expose parts of their body and present them in public.

It says it's a form of sexual harassment. They're actually harassing the men. And if you read any book, books like this, the female brain by Luan Bresson, Dean, and books about the way male and female brains work, you'll see that the way a man reacts to seeing a woman is completely different to the way a woman reacts to seeing a woman seeing a man sorry, it's completely different.

And this is why Allah subhanaw taala gives us the laws that he gives us.

So the message is given that a woman can present her body as she likes in public and kind of harassment, okay, because that's the effect that it has on men. And but the man must not react in any way. And he's supposed to carry on as normal. Right? But that's not really fair. That's not fair at all.

So what Islam does, it says let's remove that completely from the public space.

But it doesn't mean that men have no responsibility. Okay, hijab does not mean that a man doesn't have responsibility on his own actions. We're not nobody can say that, Oh, this rape happened or that happened? Oh, it's the girl's fault. No, it's not like that at all. It's not being said at all. Because Allah subhanaw taala holds everyone accountable for their own actions. And he tells the men first to lower their gazes. However, we're going to stand in front of Allah as individuals, aren't we? So we can only talk about what we did. And what part we played in making society healthy in obeying Allah subhanaw taala on his terms, so sisters, those sisters who have observed hijab, I will

just encourage you to renew your intention. Make your intention even stronger. You're doing this for the sake of Allah. Yes, there's hardships. Yes, people do sometimes look at you in a certain way. But believe me, you have a Nora, you have a light that Allah Subhana Allah gives to the believers that you might not be able to see, but other people can see.

And it's a light that's much more powerful than makeup. Realize that our sisters in France and elsewhere, they actually really look up to the sisters in Britain. They really do. And their sisters who I've met from France, they say, wow, you know, you Muslims in Britain, you're so strong. You're so you're able to be so you express yourself so confidently. So they look up to us. So let us use that in a positive way. Let us realize that we're role models for them and for others,

but also check your standards. You know, ask yourself, Have my standard started started slipping? Have I started doing something that I shouldn't really be doing? Am I really asking myself? Would Allah be pleased with me when I'm going out? Or am I just trying to actually beautify myself in some way?

And I will give you glad tidings that if you patiently persevere,

especially in this difficult climate, then definitely Allah subhanaw taala will give you a great reward. And to my sisters who do not yet where he jumped.

me make a firm intention today.

Because even if you die before you fulfill that intention, Allah will reward you because you have

that intention, make that intention today. And don't wait for the future, a future that we don't even know exists.

As I mentioned, in many ways, I know that everyone has their own personal struggles. However, in many ways, the climate today is much easier for wearing hijab. You know, it's seen as a normal thing now, in society. It's not seen as something strange or weird or not at all. Just remember those sisters, you used to wear it, you know, back in the 80s, and 70s, who literally were spat out, who were literally made fun of, he just pulled off in the playground, constantly called names, etc. That's not the situation now in Britain at all. Hamdulillah. So realize that you have a much easier situation, look at the company that you're keeping. Is it helping you to get closer to Allah? Or is

it hindering you?

If your friends won't accept you with hijab, then they're not really your friends. You've really got to ask yourself, are they really my friends, because they should be accepting me for my beliefs, and whatever I want to do. And believe me, if those friends don't continue accompany Allah will replace them with better friends.

And realize also

that even if you don't start wearing hijab, look at the times when you will be wearing hijab, whenever you pray, you have to wear your hijab, whenever you go on hydrocodone, right, you will have to wear it.

And the day that you die, you will wear hijab,

whether you wear it in this life, you know while you're alive or not the day you die, you know if any of you have ever seen a person being shrouded

with the cuff, and one of the things that the woman women are shrouded with is first of all, the hijab, they put the hijab is put on them. So definitely on that day, you will wear hijab,

so do it in your life, rather than waiting till that moment of death, when you're gonna wear it anyway.

Do it such that you can stand up in front of Allah and say, Your Allah I chose it of my own accord, not that other people put it on me. I chose to obey you. And I chose to go against my knifes

and may Allah subhanaw taala make all of the struggles that any one of us are, you know, struggling with, easy for us because everyone has their own struggles, hijab is one of them.

And may Allah subhanaw taala make it easy for a whole community may Allah Subhana Allah reward the women and the girls have in the west especially who are observing hijab who are trying to observe hijab want to observe hijab want to obey him in any aspect, more than than anything we could imagine. Because of the struggle that we're going through because of the Saba that we need to have a May May Your will piano be a sweet day for us because of the Sabra that we had.

And sha Allah with that I will close Subhana Allah on my will be having to get a shadow Allah Allah does not feel like

was a very eye opening and inspirational talk. One of the points that I wasn't aware of was obviously when I wasn't born in 70s.

The fact that systems who did wear hijab how difficult it was for them. And for us how easy it is because so many of us do work a job. So we should be grateful for that. Lots of other gems takeaway. So if you have any, please do share on Facebook, Twitter, hashtag your jobs. And Alison.

We will be having a short q&a session. I'm just going to make a few announcements. Before we do that.

This talk is recorded and it will be shared on YouTube and via email so you will get a link. So if you missed any points, don't worry too much about that.

There is a donation budget outside on the registration table. So this organization is right. This organization is run solely on donations and is a nonprofit organization. So any donations that are given, it's appreciated.

There are refreshments at the back so tea and coffee and sweets and things like that. So if you want to help us out

their next event will be a coffee morning that's taking place here on Wednesday morning 10am to 12pm. We're hoping to have it every month. We will have some on weekends as well. So this is my work as income children and women are welcome. We're hoping to have interactive workshops on different topics every month. So please do attend and Shahnawaz. So if anyone has

In the questions Who

is also rockin?

Sister,

Karen, for giving us such an amazing talk. I just have

one question with regards to the higher the human shootings we are known. I have listened to Dr. Estrada minutes, the Quran and he says that that desire mentioned about covering the bases. And I also listened to your debate about gender for God. And I just sort of wondering that what is?

What is your personal opinion about data about the race of face? As well as? Okay, it's covering? You haven't really touched this point at all. So.

Okay, just for the question. So I purposely didn't address it in the talk, because I wanted to focus on

covering everything except the face enhance, you know, as a minimum, really?

However, yes. So there are scholars who,

who consider the Tafseer of some of these ayat to be including the face being covered? That that is

the situation that is true. However, you know, there are other scholars who would say, No, it does include the face and the hands. However, you know, the niqab or covering the face is definitely an Islamic practice, you know, it's something that the scholars of Islam, the books of all talk about, covering of the face, you know, so nobody can say this is not an Islamic practice, or that is something that, you know, cultural thing, it's not a cultural thing, because it's so clear from the hadith of Aisha, that the, definitely the wives of the Prophet, they did cover their faces. You know,

when I say me, personally, from my limited research, I feel closer to the opinion that

although the covering of the face is a virtue, yes, and it's something was the hub, something recommended at something rewardable It is not obligatory.

So that's the opinion that I feel closer to, however, it doesn't mean it has to be black and white. You know, like, I went on, for example, if I'm going to a wedding, right, and I've got makeup on, I always wear it in the car, or if I'm working with men, when they call, I don't necessarily wear it all the time, right. However, I do wear it. So I think it's quite healthy to have that attitude as well, you know, rather than saying, I'm not going to wear it at all, right,

we should realize it's an Islamic practice. And, you know, especially if we're going to be wearing makeup and things like that, you know, we're actually adorning our faces extra, we should cover our faces. So, so, can you safely say that in order to achieve the higher standards and to higher standards of sound, you can do record, but if you are not doing you are not doing any

sin, like if you if you give extra charity or if you give extra something, you will get more reward. So at the very least it was to help you know

along those list

any other questions from anyone about anything?

Speaking? Yes, everyone can have. Okay.

Assisted you mentioned about having parties or girls, which are like in a polite way because the girls like to express themselves. So I have a daughter as well we've been here for at the moment, but I'm just sort of thinking that How should I direct her to direct her to be seen both and to observe the job and not to sort of show up even if it is among the girls? Because it is sort of a very very union trend these days that even among the girls girls like to show up their product gorgeous jewelry, dispense the case distress. So even if we are having a fight is just with the girls.

What is your saying about sort of showing off? Would you say about that? Because I'm I'm sort of confused about it. expressing yourself to what extent you can go

okay.

Yeah, for how old is that a son.

It's very much in amongst the girls amongst the boys. It's not like that.

Yeah, girls.

Yeah. So, um, in terms of hijab, I mean, at that kind of age, obviously, it's not a beauty at all. One thing I didn't mention is, I don't know, if I mentioned is that of course hijab is open entry from puberty, right? Or 15 can say, you know, age of 15.

So,

at her age, there's absolutely no obligation on that. However, it might be a good idea for her to get used to, it's where it's sometimes, you know, just so that it's not completely alien.

Yeah, she's happy about that. Just

25 Yeah, they like to dress up.

Yeah.

What would you say about this? I think honestly, generally speaking, we want to instill in our children, all of our children, the idea that we're not supposed to show off, because showing off attracts negative feelings in people, and has

evil eye or all of that kind of stuff as well. Right. So that's one reason. And also, it's not a good characteristic to have full stop, right to show off, you don't have to tell everybody everything that you've got, you know. However, in this context, I'm sure it's much more innocent than the way women show off, you know, like adults can show off, even men show off about the cars and stuff is probably much more innocent, because she's so young, right? I think at that age, you don't want to be starting to come down hard on them at all, you know, let them feel happy. Let them be. Let them enjoy what they have, however, maybe be aware of the other people who are coming to the

parties like, Are they from a similar background to you, if they're from a similar background, similar, like

financial status, if you like,

then there should be no harm in people. You know, the home usually comes when you have some people who are very wealthy in the presence or people who are very, very poor, and then they're showing off and that could cause some negative feelings or whatever. However, if if people, whatever it is, the more girls to where it should be no problem in that. And I think we should allow them to express themselves, you know, in a in that way, because if you don't allow Hello outlet for things, when people start feeling restricted, and

it can create negative feelings and thoughts. Hope that helps.

I have one more question.

As you might have mentioned already, I'm on the outside.

I work in a predominantly non Muslim area. And people don't do long serving law wear hijab, they often think well, I will say, Are you Hindu, or are you seasonal, like?

And then they asked me all sorts of questions. The girls that I work with my nurses, they always ask me questions about my hijab, you were at home? Do you were right in front of your dad, it was a question, trying to explain as best as I can. And they often ask me as well, why do you where I find that question? I know, it's really quite an easy answer. It's such a simple question, but it's quite difficult to answer, especially to a non Muslim, who doesn't know a lot about Islam. And normally, I say, Well, it's a one from my God. And because I love my God, and I believe in one God, I do I see commands. And that's what I say is that, I don't feel like it's sufficient enough. For someone who

doesn't know much about Islam.

When I'm explaining my answer to them, what how would you respond?

Um, so I guess

have you been on our IRS? Our training course? I haven't. Okay.

So, the Dow training course Call of Duty is about just this. So it really helps you to structure a conversation with Lama says, when they ask you those kinds of opening questions that are kind of like an invitation to talk about some

summary of that would be that,

first of all, obviously, you want to acknowledge their question, you know, and thank them for it. Because, you know, it's better than asking you or talking to you, and rather than having thoughts and talking about you by the back or whatever, you know, so that's, that's a good thing. And also, it goes without saying that people are curious. So it's a healthy kind of curiosity. So acknowledge it, maybe buy some time by saying, you know, do you have time to talk about it properly or can we go talk about it much or whatever it depending on the person's situation? And then I think

If you've got to really explain the whole, any thinking behind Islam to them, very basically, in order for you to understand this, I've got to explain some things to you about my outlook on life, right.

And just as you said, you know, I believe that we all have a creator.

And that creator has sent us guidance about the purpose of life, why we're here, everything about how we should live our lives in the best way. And he said, Any messages, but for our times he sent

and the Quran contains in it guidance about how we should interact with people, for healthy society.

And in order to live our lives the way the creator wants us to. And one of those commands, there's lots of commands, you know, there's things like, being kind to your neighbor, not allowing your neighbor to go to sleep hungry while you're full. You know, what I'm trying to say is we've got to make them realize it's not just the things that they always that are very visible. The Sharia is not just about chopping things off, and it's actually about really complete holistic way of society being being kind to your neighbor is part of the show. Yeah, right. So give them a bit of insight into that, let's say and covering ourselves. And then you know, you can make them empathize with you

say things like, Well, what have you seen a picture of Mary, you see a picture of, we think of a woman whose son, who's a woman who is close to God, right? How is that woman portrayed is a woman who was dressed in a certain way, this is something that God has told us about, it's even in the Bible to cover the hair for the woman, right? So I think, you know, you can have the sky's the limit, really, there's so much to say. But that's the kind of brief way to show them

the message.

And then you can add, you know, depending on the situation, but the point is not to focus on the hijab too much. Yeah. Because we've we don't want them we're not calling people to a job. Job is one of the things. So, for example, when there's a new Muslim or somebody who's just about to convert to Islam, we never talked to them about a job straight away.

That's not really and sometimes people who want to become Muslim, they say, you know, I'm not ready to a job and not really do. And that sometimes is stopping them from becoming Muslim. Now, becoming a muslim is more important, isn't it? wearing hijab, even other obligations, they'll come. But the most important thing in where they are now is to enter Islam, right? So we have to realize the priorities as well. And the same endow we're going to talk to non Muslims. The priority is to talk about God talk about the creative. And that's why I wouldn't say my God, because I would want them to kind of open their mind to the idea that they have a creator. And okay, yeah, a creator. And he's

actually created us for a purpose. And he actually gave us guidance, and sent a messenger and showed us how to live that guidance. You know, much of Heartland seeds in people's heads and for them to realize the truth, really, so.

I hope that helps.

But attend the course and then you'll have a really good, even more realistic idea of how to do it.