Maryam Amir – Female Companions in the Society of the Prophet Muhammad p
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As women, especially in the Muslim community, we have questions where
maybe we hear something specifically to our gender, and
we're like, what does that really mean? Or sometimes, because the
beautiful examples of our beloved companions are generally
frequently male, we wonder, where were the female companions during
the time of the Prophet? So Allahu, alayhi wa sallam. So so
many times, the message that we receive as women is kind of like
the subtle we weren't necessarily as present, or Islam isn't
necessarily as much for us as it is for men, even though we know
that's not true, right? Somewhere we know that's not true, but
sometimes we kind of struggle with that. So today, Inshallah, what
we're going to do is we're going to talk about three different
areas in the society of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam, and how, as a prophet, he really built the community to
support women and to make women an integral part of that community.
We're going to look at the spiritual way the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam really nourished women. We're going to
look at the the societal way, the social way the Prophet quysalam
built that relationship. And we're going to look at the emotional way
that the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam built that relationship.
So the first one, when we're looking at the spiritual side, how
many times have you heard a hadith or a verse and you're like, but
that doesn't sound like the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam that I know, raise your hand if that's been a situation,
right? And you're like, what does that actually mean? And we really
struggle with that sometimes. But look at Subhanallah, the prophet
of mercy, sallAllahu, alayhi wa salam. Sometimes in our
communities, have you ever been in a situation where you feel like
you want to ask a question to an Imam, but you don't know who to
ask because you have no idea how to even access an imam? Yeah?
Yeah. Problem, right? It's like, Okay, do I like go past that wall
and then pass those doors and let someone kick me out? And it's even
there, and I don't even know what he looks like. And yet, we have
all of these questions, and we don't know who to ask them to. But
look at the time of the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa sallam. So
the Prophet, he had a policy, an open door policy, where any
questions were welcome at any time, men and women were present
together in the halakas that he would give in teaching in times in
the masjid. This is why we have so many, so many female narrations of
things that happen, because they were present in society explaining
things that happened in the time of the Prophet, so Allah, AJ. But
in addition to that, in addition to the fact that they were present
and they were everywhere, and they were part of
the learning the Prophet saw them would give, they also requested a
special day for the for the Prophet, sallAllahu, alayhi wa
sallam. Now, when you have heard that woman had one day for the
Prophet, did you hear it before in the context of and the woman had
one special day, right? Have you heard that before? Oh, okay. Some
of you haven't heard it at all. The ones of you who have heard it,
have you ever wondered, well, why did they only have one day when
there's six other days as well? In reality, they were always present.
They were always given that opportunity. Just as men had their
own special times too. Women asked for a special time so they can ask
the more intimate questions, the ones they didn't want to ask next
to their homeboys or the command instead of homeboys, but the
Companions, who are male, they had those intimate questions that they
didn't want asked in public. So they had a special day where they
could ask those types of questions. And this is why, as Dr
Akron nanowi talks about, he's a great muhedit who lives in the UK
right now. He has a collection of over 9000 female Hadith scholars
throughout Islamic history that he's uncovered over 9000 female
Hadith scholars. That's not, that's not talking about all the
other Islamic sciences. That's specifically to Hadith. How many
of you have heard of Abu basit before? Yeah, right. You've
recited with him. Your kids maybe have memorized with him or
hossari, both of them learned from a female Quran teacher. How about
you've heard the term musty before? Yeah. Have you heard the
term musty? Yeah? No, because we're not. We don't handle it.
Unfortunately, we don't talk about the fact that we have female must
sees as well. How about which tahit What about a much tehida?
What about a filthy Have you heard the word fati? What about a filthy
ha? There are so many women of knowledge throughout our history
and who do exist right now, but the way that they were built was
in this community where the Prophet salallahu, alayhi wa salam
encouraged women's learning. Not only did he have, you know, make
himself available, and was a part of their teaching. But of course,
he also encouraged his students, or Aisha radi lahana, his other
his other wives, to teach women so we had so much access and
Subhanallah, there's a beautiful narration of a group of women who
came from the tribe of Beni alifar. They came from this tribe
and to ask the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, if they could
help in the Battle of seva. They wanted to help like, you know,
with nursing in case anyone got, anyone got injured. And he said,
with the blessing of Allah, he encouraged them to come along. And
then there was a young girl with them, and she narrates that the
Prophet sallallahu Sallam had her sitting like on a camel with the
luggage.
And for the first time ever, she suddenly sees blood underneath
her, and she is so embarrassed. I mean, like, some of us have crazy
period stories where you're like, in school and they're like, oh my
gosh, Paula is the scariest, terrible thing ever. But in
reality, some of us pretend to pray in our families when we can't
pray because of the shame and the stigma that comes with a very
natural,
bodily, natural, feminine experience. It's not okay to
pretend to pray when Islamically, we can't pray. But that's so
normal in our culture. The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa salam sees
the fact that she is bleeding, and he's like, perhaps you're on your
period. And she's like, yes. So he, the Prophet, saw, he teaches
her how to clean it. He encourages her to go, just clean it up, tells
her how to do it. And then at the end, once this, when the conquest
was, excuse me, over, he gave her a necklace, and he put that
necklace on her so Allah, and she said that she never took that
necklace off, and she stipulated in her will to be buried with that
necklace because it was so beloved to her that it was from the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Now look at this moment,
which could have been the most embarrassing one ever in front of
the greatest man to ever live, and yet it was something that became
so beloved to her she learned filth in that moment from the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, instead of shame and fear.
And when we look at just this concept of really relishing and
supporting a nourishing woman, subhanAllah, the wife of the
Prophet, sallAllahu, sallam, Salama, this is in buchare. She
used to have isti habla. So there's different types of blood.
You know, when you're on your period, that's a time of mercy
from God to rest, to take care of your body. That's a time where you
should eat, when you're not fasting, at times of, you know,
lie down, or if you need that. But the point is, this is a time of
nourishment. There's a different type of blood, which is isti
habla, which is not your period, if it comes at a different time,
that's not during the period time. So she used to have this
frequently. She would just constantly be in a state of having
blood coming out. And at that time, they didn't have pads, they
didn't have, you know, tampons. They didn't have all the types of
things that we have now. So what she would do is she would go and
pray, make your Etsy cat in the masjid of the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam. And in that Masjid she would put a tray
underneath her to catch any blood so that it doesn't fall on the
actual Masjid floor. Now the message of the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wasalam did not have a wall between men and women, so we're
talking about potentially men seeing the fact that there is a
tray underneath her. And yet, this is the wife of the Prophet
sallallahu alaihi wasallam. This is in Bukhari, and she would still
pray in the masjid of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. So
that we what we take from this is that even the times where we feel
so concerned as women, whether or not we should go to the masjid, in
such a state where it's so obvious, where men could
potentially see her, she still went to the masjid, and she wasn't
blamed or shamed by that. Now, if somebody chooses to pray at home,
may Allah bless them. That's wonderful. If somebody chooses not
to, you know, do certain things because of their Hayat, that's
wonderful. May Allah bless God that we're not we're not saying
that this is the one way you have to be, but the point is,
Islamically, there is so much mercy and that there are so many
different ways. The Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa sallam, has
taught women how we can connect to Allah that we don't necessarily
hear within our community context, but spiritually, this is the
community the Prophet, sallAllahu, alayhi salam built, and that's
why, when we look at the societal aspect of the Prophet, we look at
women being in a space where they weren't shamed or blamed for being
women. Have you ever felt like you were the ultimate fitna?
You're laughing. But have you? Have you ever been given that
message that the reason we were hijab is to protect men from their
own desires, when in reality, we were hijab because Allah asked us
to wear hijab. We are hijab to obey Allah. There are lots of
wisdoms from hijab, but we do this out of love for Allah. It's not so
that we can protect men. So look at the way the Prophet of Allah
taught personal responsibility in the message of the Prophet. This
is a narration by Ibn abdas, and it's an authentic narration where
there was a beautiful woman, masha Allah, just like all of you
incredibly gorgeous sisters, she used to pray in the front of the
women's section of the masjid of the Prophet sallallahu, sallam.
And there were young men who would come, and they would pray in the
back of the men's section because they wanted to get a glimpse of
her. And in Salah, they would look behind
to try to get a glimpse of this lahavia, rodi, Aloha, adhom. And
what's incredible to me is right now, tell me if we found out that,
like some teenagers were checking each other out in Salah, what do
you think the response would be from our community,
scandalous, angry, shaking heads, if the masjid had a men and
women's space that didn't have a wall? Do you think a wall would.
Probably be built just because of his incident. But the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, subhanAllah, he didn't build a
wall because of this. He didn't tell that woman never to come
back. In fact, we know that there's a Hadith of the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam that said, do not prevent the female
servants of Allah from going to the houses of Allah. That's a
directive not to leave, not to prevent women from coming, even if
there's a situation where some of the brothers May Allah, bless
them, had trouble lowering their gaze, and that's why in the Quran,
we're told for both men and women to lower our gaze, because with a
personal responsibility we each need to take that's very different
from I'm going to ban more than half of the population, because
I'm afraid that somebody might potentially do something that's
harmful, and then we are the ones who feel like we're being punished
when that's not the way of the Prophet, sallAllahu, alayhi wa
sallam, SubhanAllah. There is a verse revealed because of this in
swords will hijar that Allah SWT says, We know those of you who
come to the front, we know those of you who come to the back. But
that wasn't a directive to change the society's policy. And this is
why personal responsibility was so important to the Prophet
sallallahu sallam, in the way he taught interactions, the cousin of
the Prophet sallallahu sallam, one time was sitting behind him on
like their writing animal, and it was in hedge time, and there was a
woman who came up who had a question to the Prophet sallallahu
sallam, and she was really beautiful. Really beautiful,
mashallah, because all those have yet to walk Allah were just like
incredible. And she came up to the Prophet sallallahu, sallam, And
subhanAllah, the cousin of the Prophet Elfo, he's like looking at
her like, just like mashallah, Mashallah.
And imagine, like, right now with the prophets of the pray. And if
this was like, maybe, you know any man who maybe is a little bit
uncomfortable in these situations, maybe he would have told her to
leave. Maybe he would have told her to come back and ask her
father to ask the question on her behalf or somebody else, so that
we're not in this scary situation where this guy might be looking at
you, but instead, he gently turned El fuddle's face
Subhanallah, and he taught alfuddle Personal Responsibility
she is coming to ask a question. Honor this woman. Honor your
sister. Don't put her in a situation where she feels
uncomfortable, and we're not going to blame her for the beauty that
Allah has blessed her with, and we're not going to shame him for
the mistake that he's made, for being human. We're just going to
teach and train each one to be responsible for our actions and to
remember that Allah is going to hold us accountable for our
actions, and to work to live in a society where we know how to
support one another in our desire to come closer to Allah. This
companionship is the reason why Aisha rawli Allahu, anha allowed
for Omar rawli Allah to be buried in her spot when we go to mashada
nebali, how many of you have been to Medina?
Okay? And you said Salam to the Prophet sallallahu, Sallam Tamar
and Abu Bakr Al ham but imagine we would normally if, if ay Shaw
didn't say yes to Amman, we would be saying salam to Aysha radila.
She gave up being with the love of her life and her father for the
rest of time when the earth is around, so that Umar could be
there, because he asked her, when he was passing away, if he could
have the honor of being in that spot so he could be with his two
best friends. She could have said no, but out of her love, her
sisterly love for Amman, Royal dilawan, she honored him, and she
allowed him that that's such a huge sacrifice. And now we wonder,
Where are the sahabi? Yet, the sahabi yet chose, that was a
decision she made, to give that spot up to her brother. But that
was the community of the prophets and Allah Ali a where he taught
men and women how to be personally responsible and feel this
closeness to one another because of our connection to Allah that
that connection to Allah makes us allies. It doesn't make us
individuals who should fear one another. Instead, we should be
there to support one another and talking about this support
emotionally. How many times as a woman have you heard something
like, Oh, you're just being emotional. Or you've heard
something like,
Well, if you read Mark or add, you wouldn't be depressed. Or you've
heard something like, if you're not concentrating in your prayers,
of course, things are going to go wrong in your life. We hear these
messages of sadness, of human experiences of loss being related
to the fact that we're not religious enough. We're not
spiritual enough. The Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu, alayhi wa
sallam, when he received revelation, there was a time when
the revelation stopped. And, you know, we have depression in our
community. That's real. I'm not going to use the word depression
specifically, because there there's so many different types
of.
Christian, but he experienced intense sadness. He was wondering,
what happened? Did he displease Allah? Why did the revelation
stop? When he received the revelation, he was so afraid,
freaked out. He went to general Haram has seeking her support. He
was wondering, what happened to me? So many of us have struggled
with our identities, the different stages in our lives, and we
wonder, okay, what is this supposed to mean for me now? What
am I supposed to do? Now we struggle with that identity. We
used to know who we were, but now we don't. The Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wasalam knew who he was, knew where he stood in society,
and all of a sudden he's being given this revelation. He was
afraid. He went crazy. So the Prophet sallallahu Sallam has gone
through the struggles that we're going through, losing a loved one.
You know, panelists, so many of us have lost a child, have lost a
parent, have lost a grandfather, have lost someone that we love so
much, and we're told something like
it was Allah's decree, just stop crying, get over it. The Prophet
sallallahu alashim lost his mother as a child and as an adult, he
would go to visit her grave, and he would weep at his grave, at her
grave, salaloha, alayhi wa sallam. When Ibrahim, his son, was passing
away as a toddler, you know, a very young age, he started to cry,
and he was the closest person to Allah. He had the most Quran. He
had the best prayers, and yet in these times of difficulty, he
showed real emotion. Khadija radila anha was someone who was so
beloved to him. And yet, even after she passed away, years
later, Aisha is jealous of her because of that longing he had for
Khadija radiAllahu anha, the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa
sallam dealt with physical abuse when he was making sujood in front
of the Kaaba and the Quraysh dumped the entrails of an animal
on him. That's terrible, right? Physical assault. That's so
humiliating. But in addition to that, imagine the fact that false
Lima a young child, not an adult, not a teenager, like in her you
know, 1819, she's a child who's running so that she can help her
father in this situation, and she can support him against these
people who are trying to harm him. Imagine the pain as a parent of
seeing your child try to stand up for you, yes, the honor and the
pride, but also, isn't that sometimes something that you
wouldn't want to shield your child from, that's not something you
would want your child to have to see. And yet the Prophet
sallallahu wasallam dealt with the insults of, you're crazy, you're a
madman. So Allah sallam, just like today, we frequently hear things
where we feel like maybe the Islamophobia is a little too much
for us to handle, maybe the bigotry, maybe the racism, maybe
all of these things that we hear is a little too much. The Prophet
sallallahu, alayhi wa sallam went through all of that, and yet, at
the end of the day, was it that he had the most Quran or the most
Allah, or the most righteousness, or the closest, the being closest
to Allah? Did these things stop him from being real in his human
emotion. None of them did, because Salah Quran, fasting, all of these
things are integral for us to feel close to Allah, our tools that we
need to use to help us through the difficult times we go through. But
we also need to seek professional support. And this is something the
Prophet sallallahu Sallam did. He sought refuge with Khadija radila
manha when he was in this time of turmoil, and she gave him comfort,
support and guidance on what to do. Om Salama radila One ha when
the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam and his companions went
to make Amra, and they were denied Amra, and they made the Treaty of
hadavi. And the companions were so upset over this treaty that they
were they were not even following the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam orders, because they were so into the their own emotions. In
that moment, he went to om Salama, and he asked for advice, and um
Salamat, um the Prophet sallallahu Sallam went to um salamat talking
about his emotions. Om Salaman gave him advice, and that's what
the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa salam did. So we can take from
this that if we're going through something hard, the Prophet
salallahu Alaihe Salam has already taught us that it's okay to seek
advice and support, and it's so important for us to recognize that
mental health, going through depression, going through all of
these things, which sometimes people make you feel like it's
because you're not good enough. Isn't because we're not Muslim
enough. We're not close enough to Allah. We use those tools to come
closer to him, but also we seek the professional support so that
we can get through the struggles that we're going through. That's
why the new building of MCA has the Khalil Center, where you can
speak to therapists and work through counseling to work on the
issues, so that, Inshallah, we can live more whole lives when our
hearts feel like they've just shattered apart. The Prophet
salallahu, alaihi wasallam wasn't a blamer. He wasn't a shamer. He
was a trainer, and he taught every single one of his men and women
congregants how to come closer to Allah, despite the fact that in
their society, there was still issues of Zina, there were still
issues of being drunk, there were still issues of how.
Doing a ton of public and private mistakes, but yet, through that,
he taught them the message that Allah loves you. Allah loves your
struggle. Allah is here for you. And no matter what you do, there
is nothing that Allah, Subhanahu, WA Not accept. When you come to
him and you ask him for forgiveness, then no matter what
we do, if our sins filled all the way to the sky, that if we asked
Allah for forgiveness, that he would forgive us, and he wouldn't
mind, and if we did it again, and if we did it again, if we're
sincere in coming back to him and we want to have that relationship
with Him, He will forgive us and he won't mind. So remember when
we're struggling, especially as a woman, the message of the Prophet
salallahu alayhi wa sallam, that you are beloved to Allah. You are
an honored creation of Allah, and you have a very strong space in
this community and in this society, and that Islam didn't
come to mute your voices. It came to use the personality that Allah
has blessed you with, whether that's very shy or very outgoing,
whether that's very all over the place or only in one spot,
whatever Allah has blessed you with to use that for his sake in
ways that are pleasing to Him and to change the society. Because of
that, we are so honored to be woman. It is such an honor to be a
woman, and don't let anyone make you feel like that's not the
truth, because Allah, Panah, has honored our gender, and sometimes
I wonder if maybe I don't know, from our beloved to him just
because of that. Just kidding. No, no matter. Beloved to him and he,
he's had a wa Salla has honored both of us. But the important
thing is that we are allies. Men and women work together to build
that community and that space for both men and women to flourish. So
the lover that he was sent them. So now that inshallah that has
finished, we're going to do Q and A inshallah. We're going to have
these index cards, so we're going to pass them out in case anybody
wants to ask something private, but if something has come up for
you, or if you want to ask about something you haven't you know,
you've heard before, you don't understand, please feel free. This
is the space to do that. It's a safe space. Shala. None of your
questions will be judged in a judgmental way. This is the spot
to talk about them. This may let go. You.