Maryam Amir – Is it better for a woman to pray at home or in the masjid
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AI: Transcript ©
Sulu
as women, we have many experiences with the masjid and different
messages when it comes to the masjid. When I was growing up, I
wasn't really into Islam, and then I got into Islam, and then all of
a sudden, I wanted the masjid to be the place that I was constantly
going. So I would go for Fajr and I would go for Aisha. Sometimes I
would go with my dad or my brother and my mom, but a lot of times, I
would go on my home, and I would go in the middle of the night for
a pm and taraweeh and at decaf, I was constantly in the masjid, and
I would plan my whole entire schedule around the Masjid. So I
was in college, and I would think, okay, if my class is at 10am then
I'm going to go to the masjid in the morning. I'm going to sit I'm
going to do a Quran class, and then I'm going to go from the
masjid to college, and then I'm going to leave school so I can go
back for the whole even though it was like a 20 minute drive the
opposite direction. And then I would come back for my next class.
I plan my whole entire day around the masjid. And then one day, I
was in the masjid listening to a lecture, and the Imam was speaking
about all the different ways that you can be close to Allah and
connect to Allah. And he mentioned that for men, one of those ways is
being connected to the masjid. And I raised my hand, and I was like,
she is that also for women? Like, so excited. Like, this is me. I
love them. I'm here. I'm here. Mimi. Mimi. Me. Is it also for
women. And he said, No, this is only for men.
And then he said that this, you know, loving, being attached to
the masjid is really something that is for men. For women, it's
better for you to
pray at home. And that, that message, he didn't say, it's
sinful for you to pray at the masjid. He didn't say, it's not a
good idea for you to pray at the masjid. He didn't say, going to
the masjid is not like a good thing to do. But he said it's
better for a woman to pray at home. And I went from being
obsessed with the masjid and finding my you know, there is
something so special about the masjid being here, you feel a
certain type of connection with Allah that may be very different
from the experience that you have just in your own home, hearing the
Imam recite when they reciting in Salah, being there to meet other
believers and saying salam, building that community,
especially here, we don't live in a place where we hear the Adan and
The and we can go into any building, and all of a sudden
we're surrounded by people who make us feel close to Allah. We
are fighting for our iman every day. We are trying to keep keep
with it, no matter where we are. And so when he said that, I went
from being someone who was obsessed with the masjid to
someone who, at that time in my life, I was just starting to get
into a span. I didn't have real mentors. The mentors that I had
were women who I looked in the message and I said, who is dressed
in the most conservative way to me, in the most strict way to me.
And there was, I'm just telling you, the language I used as an 18
year old in my head. I'm not saying this is language we should
use today in my head, this is the language I use, and how can I ask
them to be my mentors? So I went to these women in the masjid, and
I asked them if they could teach me, if they could be my teachers.
They hadn't studied anything. They were random women who just were in
the masjid. They had recent many of them had recently come from
countries like Egypt and Jordan. Very wonderful woman, very, very
kind, very sweet woman. But they don't have degrees in Islamic law.
They haven't studied Islam seriously, but they were there,
and so I asked them if they could start mentoring me. And between
the messages that I received from them, which is, it's better for a
woman to stay at home. It's better for men to never see her. It's
better for men to never, ever speak to her, no matter what.
Okay. That might be possible in some realities. And even when I
lived in Egypt, that was not quite exactly the norm of living in
Egypt when I was studying there, but here, when you go to the
grocery store, when you go to your school library, I would walk into
my library, and when I would go there, the security guard would
say hello, and he was like, you know, an elderly man saying hello
to me? And I'd be like, it's helpful. I can't say hello to a
man. And it sounds funny now, but in the moment, for me, it was this
internal just dichotomy of, I want to be close to Allah, but there
are men and they're saying hello, and they're not Muslim, and they
don't know they're not supposed to say hello to me. And so I started
looking at these messages and my role in the masjid. So when the
Imam said it's better for a woman to pray at home, I went from
bringing in the masjid, 24/7 as much as possible to never going to
the masjid. And that shift all of a sudden is one that you know when
you take away the place that you feel closest to Allah, and then
suddenly you take it to somewhere else where you don't have that
same place of connection. It really broke me. I went through a
time of just feeling like I was so sinful because I missed the
masjid, feeling bad that I wished that Islam supported.
Did women encourage women to go to the masjid? Do you know the
feeling of like going to your home, but wishing that you could
be in the masjid and then feeling bad that you had that wish?
Because Allah knows better. Have you ever felt that way? So for
you, tell me you're nodding your head. What are the messages? Can I
have someone volunteer with the mic to walk around with it? Thank
you so so much. If you don't mind, because we're gonna have I'd love
to hear your your reflections on this. Thank you. There's a sister
in the back. Can you share with us? No, no, okay. Is there a
sister who can share with us how you have felt when it comes to
messaging and the message? Have you ever been home and thought, I
wish I could pray in the masjid? Oh, I feel bad that I wish that I
could pray in the message, because Allah knows better, that it's
better that it's better for me to pray at home. Or have you ever
wondered, why is it better for a woman to pray at home than the
Masjid? Have you ever had those types of thoughts and reflections?
And if yes, are you willing to share with us those thoughts or
reflections? This is a safe space. Yes, a sister, right there. Thank
you.
Yes, like, I definitely felt that way, because I have that pull
towards that shit, and I love going to Jurong. I, like, kind of
like, I would tell myself, making a felt on myself to go to Jurong
every, like, Friday, especially when I went to public school, no,
right? That was, like, my only, like, you know, bit of discount
that I get every single week. Um, so, yeah, when you hear that,
like, parenting says, like, it's better for women's premade
thinking, like she's not going to say sometimes all the sisters
she's seen, and that's extra, you know, that's extra more than you
get. You know, she's not going to, you know, tell her maybe, like,
confide in someone in the event her abnormal issues that's going
on when she would just go to the mission, right? Um, those benefits
and then, and then the programs like, she's not going to
necessarily know about everything. She's like, I mean, unless she's
like, super active on like, you know, now we have social media at
the end, we didn't so like, she would have all of the programs.
There's so much access that she's not going to get, you know, just
praying, I don't if that's like, if she believes that she is like,
best, and she gets her full reward, and the man gets a full
reward over there he's getting, like,
you know, almost getting that brother, that sister is missing,
right? Yeah, just you said something very specific. And Ibn
Josie mentions this, that women today, many times, we are the ones
who raise children. A lot of times, women have the brunt of
child rearing, but we don't necessarily actively go to the
masjid or go to places of knowledge, not because we don't
want to, but sometimes a it could be we're busy, et cetera, but
sometimes we're just not encouraged to. And so who is
really teaching the next generation when those women
ourselves don't have the access to know what to teach? So thank you.
That's very important, especially when you mentioned public school.
You're going to public school. You needed the masjid as that kind of
place of connection. Does that? Call it Hannah? Does anyone else
want to share? Yes, this
country in the early 80s, okay, wide spaces, right? When we came
here, I
decided this is what we're going to do when you're starting
to
know, going to moss. And thankfully, my husband encouraged
me to take our children out of the school on Fridays to come to the
mosque, because that was their introduction and their ability to
make connections to Yes, exactly. And
I would say my husband's family is pretty well free thinking, because
back then, in the 80s and 90s, there was still around here
whether or could be on the board of a boss right and talk to the
person right on the phone. Yes, very
conservative. And I've seen some of the change, but I would hope
that there would be more change. Thank you for that last statement.
You've seen some of the change, but you hope there could be more
change. You would think that from the 80s there would be more of a
shift. But the questions that I'm receiving now are the same
questions that I had 20 years ago. So that's telling me that we
haven't had that type of shift that we need, and they're same
questions, can women be on the board of the Masjid. There's a
masjid that I know of. When I was 16, they were discussing whether
or not a woman could be the president of the Masjid. When I
was 26 they finally decided, no, she's She can't be, but she can be
on the other positions. And now that I'm 36 they're discussing,
still, whether or not it's permissible, when we should? We
continue talking about this for 20 years, while we've lost an entire
generation of young people who don't even come back because they
feel like they have no space in the masjid. It's panala. You've
seen that. You've seen that change, echo of Hayden for sharing
and the fact that you said you want your children to grow up in
the masjid. You know, like today in the UK, hamdullah, there are
more and more women's spaces, but there are still misattids that
don't allow women to enter them. They're in the UK. I have had
women tell me stories that they go to the masjid because they need to
pray, and they're out and they're told, Go to the go to the mall,
they have a faith center down the street and pray there. Women have
told me they prayed on the concrete in front of the masjid,
and women have said that they've gone to the church down the street
and have prayed in the church.
Church down the street because the empty Masjid will not allow a
woman to pray inside. Where do we expect woman Iman to be if we're
not allowing us into the most sacred spaces of Allah's final
child's homes? And then we say women's most important role
raising children, really, and also wearing hijab really.
Thank you. Thank you so much for sharing that Does anyone else want
to share? Yes. It's
also like, how we
Intuit like, I think I was one of the made it that wants to make it
easy, yes, yes, yes. Also understands that, you know, if you
have a child that's really young, so you yourself don't
feel guilty,
because my you he wants to make it easy for like, not have
that guilt on our
period. He's doing that to make it
easy for us. I think, like, it's kind of how my dream, like
it's, like you said, it's not a sin or forbidden for us
to go because we're taking care
of by whatever we should feel so like guilty and realize that it's
all it's okay. And also like, I feel as now as my child is older,
I can go more, right? And I feel like, you know, Ramadan, I like to
come here for Karami, because I feel like, to be honest, I just
feel like I get more here than I do, right? I feel like I'm not
like,
at home, I do it so quickly, right? And I'm not, you're paced
here. You have a group here, you have a leader here, yes,
have like that,
that at home, it's not the same, yeah, so yeah, yeah. But then we
should also feel guilty
or unable yes to come Yes, because, you know, for so what you
mentioned about, you know, the ease that Allah has made it easy
for us, that we can stay home, especially when we have
responsibilities yet, like young children, that framing is,
Alhamdulillah, a framing that either you have come to on your
own, or someone has mentored you to have, or you've heard in
lectures that that you've come to the understanding that Allah so
merciful, children are so intense. Being at the message constantly
with young children is literally impossible, and Allah, out of His
love and mercy and care, he has made it easier for women to simply
pray at home and receive the same reward and receive more reward.
Yes, and
I do feel like here, if they have in the past, we're lucky in the
past decade, and we have some changes. Yes, here, like, I don't
know about other states, because I can only stay for California, but
now I
should have like,
children, like children's room, right? The kids are really
allowed. It's more accessible for kids. Yeah, right, in some parts
of the world, yes, that is true. You're not feeling as bad to bring
your child. Yes. And what I want to just point out is this
understanding. Did you have that understanding before you were a
mom?
Oh,
of it being like a mercy from Allah, that it's okay that we
don't have to go to the masjid because we might be too busy
taking care of children or just other responsibilities. I mean, I
knew that, like, even
when we were in college or whatever, I felt like, Oh, when I
could come and I would come, because, again, I was coming more,
because I felt like I was doing more at the mercy. More, okay,
yes, okay, exactly. So feeling like, okay, okay, let me what I
want to take out from this is this point there is a difference
between, I know that I can come to the masjid. I know that I have the
space to come, that I feel the comfort and the reward and all of
that. And also, if I'm a mother and I can't I get the reward of
staying home. There's a difference between that and feeling guilty
for wanting to come, because it's better that I'm not there, and
you're telling me you understood from the beginning that I can go
and I can feel that experience. But also, if I stay home, then
that's also rewarded. And that Masha Allah is beautiful. It
speaks to how you've seen Allah. It speaks to your optimism and
hope and who Allah is and Islam, and the messaging that you've
received surrounding that. And I think that that is not necessarily
the same messaging that some people receive when it comes to
entering the Masjid. So that is the messaging we want people to
have. Your messaging is a messaging is a messaging we want
women to experience. But for someone, thank you for sharing all
of that. Yes. For someone who has it, yes, share with us a
little different. When I was 15 years old, I had attended this so
that they were giving out three copies of San Diego, Bucharest.
Let me see
what's
inside. What's interesting because, as I did, read the Hadith
about young
women, preferably staying at home, but I also read this
hadith marketing to not prevent them from going to the masjid at
night. Yes, yes. And so for that, I was like, hooray. So I would go
to all these.
Yeah. So my
mother would be like this, 12 o'clock, you're driving all the
way to
Orange County. I was at it's
like, look, Allah's going to protect me. The Prophet says,
Allahu
Akbar, yes. And this is very important, because that passage is
in Sahih al Bukhari, but the passage about a woman's prayer
being better at home is not in Sahih al Bukhari. So when we see
authentic narrations encouraging women to go to the masjid, all of
them are in Bukhari, but the ones that talk about it better for
being better for a woman to pray at home are actually none of them
are in Bukhari and Muslim. So that's something that we're going
to discuss today. Inshallah, thank you for mentioning that. Does
anyone else want to share we can get maybe? Share? We can get maybe
two more reflections, and then we'll go into the salah.
Inshallah,
okay, we are going to go straight to the thank you so much for
taking the oh, we have one more. One more.
It's not a misconception. We're going to talk about it right now.
Inshallah, yeah. Thank you so much for taking the mic around. So
there are
Thank you just akala Feynman, thank you. We can just leave it
here. Financial Q and A Thank you. So when it comes to women in the
masjid scholars, from the majority medhib, so I know not everyone
knows what a Madhab is. I'm just going to quickly say they're legal
schools. So if you think of like Imam Sohaib, Webb described this
beautifully, Oxford and Stanford or Harvard, they're just schools.
UCLA, they have their own law schools. In the law schools, they
have their own methodology of how they teach law. So that is very
specific to the school. If you go to a particular school, maybe you
meet someone who's part of that cohort, and you're going to
understand that that school has a curriculum that they work through
to teach law. Same thing with the medakhi. So the Hanafis, the
malikis, the shafiries and the hanbadis, they all have their own
methodology when it comes to looking at texts, they look at
Quran, they look at Hadith, and then they come to legal rulings,
and that's Phil. So Phil is the understanding of the text, the
divine text, and how we're going to take rulings from them. So
these medahebi scholars, overwhelmingly, their position is
that it is better for women to pray at home than the masjid. And
let's talk about a few reasons why. Who can tell me a hadith that
they they know about a woman praying in the masjid, that it's,
excuse me, at home, that it's better for her to pray at home
than the masjid, what is usually used to tell us that to describe
to women, any any ideas?
Yes,
actually can't do mine. Yeah, maybe we could just move back and
forth whenever I have a few questions. Thank you so much.
Subhanallah, Subhanallah, Subhanallah, Subhanallah, Subhana.
WA basically, I don't know like the exact words, but the gist of
it is that a moving to spring at home and hidden the most
hidden
room would get more adjured. The
masjid and praying. Thank you. Thank you. So the general concept
of one of these hadith is that it's better for a woman to pray in
the innermost part of her home, that it's better for her to pray
there than even in her living room, that the even in her
bedroom, it's better for you than your living room. In your bedroom,
it's better than your bedroom, it's better than your bedroom to
play in, like the innermost part. Like, do you have a closet you can
pray in? It's better for her to pray. There any other Ahadith that
you've heard about women's praying in home, versus the Masjid?
Okay, so this is one. There are others like, for example, that it
do not prevent women do let them narrow ima Allah, Masjid ALLAH, do
not prevent the maid servants of God from the houses of God. This
is another this is authentic in buchare. There's a second part of
it. That's that is also included in some of the Hadith books, and
that is, and their homes are better for them, and their homes
are better for them. That's another narration. So we mentioned
the one that the sister mentioned. Now we mentioned the second one,
and there's a third one, and then this third one, it's the hadith of
umphremaid. So you may have heard of this hadith of a woman who
speaks to the Prophet sallallahu Sallam and tells him that she
loves to pray behind him, that she she loves to pray behind the
Prophet Allahu a Salam. And he acknowledges this, and then he
tells her that it's better for her to pray in her home. And there's a
head there in this narration, I'm just going to read the narration
for you so that Inshallah, we have the exact wording, but she is also
it's also talking about her, the Masjid of her city, of her
village, her area, is better than a masjid that's further away. So
the Prophet salallahu alayhi wa salam says, in this translation,
Bismillah, I'm a
messenger of Allah. I like to pray with you. He is reported to have
said, I know that you like to pray with me, but your prayer in your
room is better for you than your prayer in your courtyard, and your
prayer in your courtyard is better for you than your praying in your
house, and your prayer in your house is better for you than your
prayer in the mosque of your.
People, and your prayer in the mosque of your people is better
for you than your prayer in my mosque. So that's the message of
the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Now these are the three
narrations that are most used to discuss why it's better for a
woman to pray in her home than in the masjid. But all of these
narrations have discrepancies in their authenticity, every single
one of them. So while they are mentioned, for example, the one I
just said is in Imam Ahmed sahih. There's another Hadith scholar,
Ibn Al huzema, who has doubt about the narration. And the same thing
with the I'm not going to go through the Hadith chain of
narrators, because I don't think knowing each person's name and
what their issue is in the chain is relevant to our discussion at
this moment. But every single chain, there is a concern where
some Hadith scholars say it is an authentic narration, and other
Hadith scholars say it is not an authentic narration, Omid
narration, for example, Dr jathur Auda, who is a huge scholar today,
masha Allah, He focuses on Maqasid, which are objectives of
Islamic law. He talks about the context of the hadith of mphammay.
What is the context of the hadith of mphammay that she was very far
away from the masjid of the Prophet he was salam, and she and
a group of women would go together, and they would walk to
the masjid back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and
back and forth five times a day is a lot of walking, many miles. The
husband of Umayyad was upset about how often she was going back and
forth. Now this is slightly different topic, but just to
mention, as a nuanced position, marriage in Islam is a contract,
which means that if a woman, of course, I'm not talking about
circumstances of abuse that always, always needs a different
situation, but, but men and women are in a contract, which means men
and women in a marriage who do not want to stay in marriage, women
have the right to say she no longer wants to stay in a
marriage. And this happened in the time of the Prophet salallahu
alayhi. He was set up the woman Companions would get married,
would no longer stay married, would get married again. So if om
famil did not want to stay married, she didn't have to stay
in that marriage. But she wants to stay with Abu fam, with her
husband, and she's asking the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam, and the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is giving her
marital advice on how to maintain her relationship with her husband
so that she doesn't have this argument that's happening about
the masjid. And on top of that, if there's another there's another
Sheik, who mentioned that Abu Hamid, what he would do is he
would distract her in prayer that there were things he would do to
distract him her. And so the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa
sallam is telling her, praying in a quiet, private area is better
than Ukraine. Here is better than you praying here is better than
you praying here. And she, who's a modern, contemporary scholar
today, he's a huge scholar. He mentions that this narration is
just for Umayyad. It's not intended to be for all women until
the end of time. So if omkid narration is the one that's most
used to establish the fact that it's better for a woman to pray in
her home, and that narration, according to these scholars, is
actually not intended to be for all women. It's intended to be for
umphamid or women in umphamid situation, okay, then what about
the other Ahadith? So we said that first part do not prevent a woman
from going to the masjid. That narrow Imam Allah said, You Allah,
that that hadith is in Bukhari, but the second part is not, yes,
some scholars deem it authentic, but other scholars look at it and
say that was someone's edition, which means, let me tell you what
that means. Let's say
sister. What's your name? Neda, okay. Neda, so neta, say anything
to me, little, just give me one
sentence. I'd like to have pi Netta, okay, so now I'm gonna tell
what is your name,
Ashley, okay, I'm gonna tell Ashley. Hey, Ashley, did you know
Netta said I want to have pie. I love pie.
I love pi. Did she say I love pi? No, I said that. Can she
differentiate between who said I love pi? It's obvious that you
heard that, and you know you understand I'm saying I love pi,
but in 500 years, do they understand who is saying I love
pi? So this is what the Hadith scholars look at is that second
portion and their homes are better for them from the Prophet, peace
be upon him, or from the person who narrated the Hadith. Do you
understand? So now we have three narrations in which scholars have
discrepancy on whether or not it's better for a woman to pray at home
or in the masjid, and the only authentic narrations we have about
women praying in the masjid is the one that says, do not prevent
them. Is the one that encourages them to go in the night. And also
are the actions of the woman companions themselves, as well as
the discussions on the reward of praying in the masjid.
Because when we're looking at the reward of praying in the masjid,
we know that there is extra reward right in praying in the masjid.
But I myself, when I was going through that time period that I
spoke about in the beginning, I thought that was only for me. I
thought that if I went to the masjid, that reward wasn't for me.
Did you ever feel that? Did Have you ever thought that? No, that's
good. Good for you. Okay, I'm happy for you. Yes. How strong is
the
information about the murder? Well, I'm quoting Dr Jasser Auda.
And Dr Jasser is is an expert in Hadith sciences and looking at
contexts of rulings. So I'd have to ask him. I'm just quoting him,
but I can ask him Inshallah, and I can let you know Inshallah, but
this is literally his expertise, looking at the context for why
things were revealed and what could potentially be the reasoning
behind them. So
based on his expertise. This is what I'm quoting, Dr Akram nedawi,
who's also a hadith scholar whose expertise is in this issue this
he's also the one who brings up the discrepancies in the Hadith in
quoting Ibn Hazm, who is considered the fifth legal school.
So Ibn Hazm is a Lahiri school. That means, kind of the literalist
school. It's not really a school that's applied. You won't really
meet Muslims who are like, I'm Lahiri versus Yomi, Muslims who
will say I'm Hanafi or I'm Maliki or I'm shahiri, you won't really
meet anyone who says they're Lahiri. But Ibn Hazm, he was a
scholar in Spain. He was a Spanish scholar, and his rulings are still
rulings that scholars look to and they use and they derive rulings
from, even though his meth have itself isn't necessarily a
practiced one. So Ibn Hazm also talks about the same issues within
these Ahadith, that there are these, there are these issues in
the in the authenticity, in the context. Look at everything else.
Let's look at everything else. So when we look at, for example, the
reward of women going to the masjid, it's the same as the
reward of men. And Ibn Hazm mentioned, are we going to say
that a woman who goes out and she goes out in the rain, and she
walks to the masjid, and she gets her clothes dirty, and she makes
all of this effort that she's not going to receive the reward,
because it would have been better for her to pray in her home. Are
we going to say that all of that wasn't worth it, because it's
better for her that she wasn't there in the first place? And Ibn
delhita aid, he's another scholar who talks about the fact that
this, this idea of,
you know, the word men. Sometimes the Quran uses men like, for
example, in the ayah, in certain Noor Allah says Men region, so men
who are not distracted by like trade or like other worldly
things, um, the Killa, they're not distracted by these things from
the remembrance of Allah, the word is, the word used is men, but
there are Doctor Jasser, he talks about this concept of men being a
word used that include men and women. It's like saying human.
It's like saying mankind. Do we say mankind and we don't mean
women. We also mean women. We should just say humankind, but we
say mankind, and we intend women to be a part of that. And this is
the same for the ayat that, unless it's specified, this is
specifically only for men that women are included, which means
those who are seeking the masjid that are described so beautifully
as those who are not, you know, distracted from this world, from
this life, they also include women. And in the same way, the
reward that's described for men going to the masjid also includes
women. So now we're talking about, okay, we have authentic narrations
that say it's better for a woman to pray in the masjid. Well, not
to be prevented from the Masjid. We know that the reward for women
to go to the masjid is the same as men. So what about the woman
companions? They were the women who lived in the time of the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. They would have seen the
Prophet sallallahu Sallam and the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam wouldn't have wanted something for the women companions
that wasn't the best for them. You have a prophet of God. He is not
going to see women entering the message and say, sisters, it's
better for you to pray at home if it was actually not good for them
to be there. They live in a Muslim society. They are hearing Bilal
give the Adan. They can access the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa
sallam. At any time, women have Tuesdays, specifically one day to
go and visit the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and
ask their questions. So it's not like it's the first time someone's
visiting Medina, and they're only there for a week, and it's the
only opportunity they're going to have with the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam. They're with the Prophet all the time. They can
visit his house. They have more access. Women have more access
than men do to the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam,
through the Mothers of the Believers. Because they can go to
multiple Mothers of the Believers and go to them and say, I have a
question about the Prophet. Saw them ask her the question. She
could say, Can I meet with the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam, if he's not there, there's so much access for a woman in the
time of the Prophet SAW to so to say that the reason that women
would go to the message was.
Just to be with the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is not
applicable here, because they could have been with him
elsewhere. SallAllahu, alayhi wa sallam. What is the reason why we
often say it would be better for a woman not to go to the masjid?
Tell, tell. Think about it. Why would it be better for a woman to
stay at home? And I don't want you to to think about the ruling of
the point of it's easier. We will talk about this point from a silk
perspective, that it's easier for women if they have kids, if they
have responsibility, we'll talk about that separately. So that's
not the issue beyond that. Let's say a woman doesn't have kids.
Let's say a woman lives on her own. Let's say a woman is 15 and
she doesn't have major responsibilities to her family. If
her family doesn't have that structure, she just has time and
she wants to go to the masjid. Why would it be better for this girl
or this young woman or this elderly woman, or whatever her
age, when she can just go, why would it be better for a woman to
be at home? Tell me what's the reason you hear or what's the
reason you think? What's the reason you've been given? Yes,
I've grown
up with no. Thank you. It's, can you hear her? Although, oh, you
can. Okay, it's
easier for the men not to have the women, because the women are a
distraction. Of course, the only woman in the masjid, and there's a
bunch of men I would feel uncomfortable, or if I'm in a
space
where
they walk, where they walk behind me to find the prayer, prayer
that I would be
uncomfortable if they can see your body, especially making sajda
Absolutely, thank you. You definitely echoed the exact things
that I heard growing up as well anyone else?
Have other people heard that that is the reason Yes, yes? Has anyone
heard a different reason, or is that always the reason?
Yes? Some
some,
one of the masjid where I went, there was the one who would be
attending the parish and shut up the press was being dead when he
was I don't exactly remember what person was at night, or he would
stand in front and of where the ladies were the bad and
but one of the one of the ladies, objected to the fact that, why
should the man come to the ladies session and and have the prayers
there for the ladies, if he has a separate place? I mean, for the
men basically going to that.
And she really objected to the fact that she said, we know it
should not be there at all.
I think this is
not right. You know, we are supposed to be letting you go
anyway. So
you're going to be behind the remark anyway.
So it's okay there are men in front of you, and then you are
seeing it back. But then again, you're objecting to the
fact that you're looking in the backs
of
the men, yes, your consideration is not with Yes, yes, yes.
So this Yes, thank you. And you point to a very important, you
know, internal issue. When we make our own struggles internally
rulings of Islam, it impacts policy. So if you have someone who
says, you know, if I see men, or if men see women, they get
distracted from salah. Okay, that could be true in some ways, and
that's why we have, we have women praying in the back, men in the
front. Okay, let's talk about, we are going to talk about, going to
talk about the structural issues in a minute, inshallah. But beyond
that, let's just say that a person says, Because of this, women
should never come to the masjid, or men should never come to the
masjid. You are now taking a personal issue struggle and making
it a policy, and you know, in 10 years, when you know, maybe those
who were not there, who didn't know what happened, weren't aware
of why that policy was made. It just becomes policy when that's
the only Masjid you ever have access to growing up, you then see
that as Islam. So is it really all of Islam, or is it one person who
made a decision, who maybe had the power to make the decision, who
impacted the culture of the masjid and then imparted a specific
message about women's presence in the masjid Paul, thank you so much
for sharing that anyone else Yes. Can you say a letter you hear
sometimes, always
better echo what you're saying about
the personal structure that struggle. Sometimes they'll say,
It's better. It's better for it's
better. Oh, sure, sure, sure, sure, yes, yes,
absolutely. We're doing this for them for Yes. Well, every rule
that we have, there is some sort of group that decides, oh no, it's
better to go to one
app right, right? And where is that coming from? So that goes
back.
Set of Raja which is preventing blocking the means to evil. It's a
it's a methodology, method, a lot methodological tool
in Phil, which is the soul of felt it's preventing blocking the means
to evil before the evil even happens. It could potentially
happen at some time. So it's better to prevent it from the
beginning, before it even happens. And unfortunately, often women are
the brunt of who take the brunt of the pain when that ruling comes to
play. And that ruling has using that it's not a ruling, it's a
tool. Using that tool has conditions. You can't use the tool
forever. It might work at a specific time period, and that's
the only time it's supposed to be meant for. But maybe those
scholars pass away, and they didn't mean for it to be used for
7000 more years or 700 more years. And if they were alive today and
they saw that rule in place, they would be angry, because they would
say, this is not how it's supposed to be applied. But you know, we
respect our scholars. We talk about our classical scholars. We
honor our classical scholars in our tradition, which we should
100%
but I think we also need to look at what would they say if they
were here today, would they really make that same ruling that we are
quoting them about from so long ago? Thank you. Anyone else?
Okay, so if the issue is that women are going to be seen by men,
Abu, he wrote the book Tahrir Mara, which is the liberation of
women. Tahrir Mara, I mentioned it in the last time when we had the
on the woman series, he this Shaykh was intending to write a
book about the Sira of the Prophet sallallahu, a that he would send
them just the life of the prophet, Holy Son of he read so many
narrations in buchare and Muslim about women and the women
companions that he had never come across. And he was so shocked to
hear. And when he read all of those narrations, he just realized
that they need a book about women and the time of the Prophet
sallallahu ascendant. And he called up all his friends in
different groups, like, you know, there's different people who
identify different ways Islamically, he called up all the
different ones that he knew. None of them had heard of these
narrations before. So he compiled a book with authentic narrations
from Bukhari and Muslim, and that book was banned in some Muslim
countries. Even though it's literally in Bucha and Muslim,
it's just compiled into one book. So he compiled those narrations,
and then he had other statements about certain Hadith or verses,
and he explained them, and he brought scholars explanations for
them. And yet that was too dangerous in some some countries
that they actually banned it. So he mentions that a few points.
Number one, we talked about it being better for a woman not just
to pray in in the home, in the innermost part of her home, right?
Who is usually in your home? Who
your mahram? Your brother, your husband, your father, your mahram?
So who are you hiding from? If the issue is women distract men. If
the issue is women distract men, why would you need to be in the
innermost part of your home in the first place? So is it really about
men, or is it about you having focus and hoshua and humility and
concentration in Salah? I have a four year old and a seven year old
Hamdulillahi hamdullah. It's getting a lot easier now that
they're a little older. But for any of you who've had children
this age, or those who do that right now, yeah, praying with
focus. That's, that's a, yeah, I don't know. That's a, that's a,
you know, it's a thing. It's not a thing. I should say, they want to
climb your back. They call you every second they try to, oh my
gosh, the amount of times they go under my do they go under your
prayer thing and they try to like they think it's so funny, they
think it's a tent, and they laugh each other have a ghost. Yeah,
concentration is is an issue. So if you're able, obviously, for the
safety of your children, you don't want to hide from them if it's not
safe. But can't you focus more when you are in the innermost part
of a place where you know no one is going to bother you and you
have five minutes just for yourself. Salah is a connection
with Allah. It's a healing connection. It's a reset for
ourselves. It's taking that time to take a breath and to come back,
whether it's work or school or children or whatever it is, it's
taking a moment to recenter and come back. So when we're talking
about praying in the innermost part of your home. Is it really
about men not seeing us, or is it about being able to bring that
full focus? Now, why would there be an emphasis on women praying at
home? If we say for the scholars who take these narrations as
authentic and say that this is for all women, that goes to our point
that our blessed sister here mentioned about children, and
there are scholars who talk about this point not being because it's
better for a woman not to attend the masjid, but rather so no woman
feels a pressure to go to the masjid when she has
responsibilities that make it difficult for her to attend. When
I went to the masjid, when my kids were like, a year like, I remember
one in three. I remember praying Lahore, and they just running,
running. I had them next to me. You know, two minutes later, they
were gone. I definitely broke my prayer. I ran out of the prayer
hall. They were down the hall like, yeah, it's difficult to pray
in the masjid when you have other people you're responsible for. But
again, not all women are mothers, and not all women are at this
stage of their.
Life of young children if they are mothers. So if you are a mother,
and you know going to the masjid is a responsibility that is so
impossible, of course, you can still go. You can absolutely but
for the pressure of it being better for you to pray in the
masjid and it being so difficult to make that reality happen when
you have so many other responsibilities, yes, take from
the scholars who say this is not meant to pressure women not to
pray at home or not to go to the masjid, but to look at her reality
and see what her reality is like, so that she feels comfort in that
reality, and that she knows that if she prays at home, she gets so
so much reward, and if she went to the message, she gets so much
reward that it's not about her sinful presence. It's not because
she's a fit enough for men because of her existence. It's better for
her circumstance. Because why? And let's talk about a few reasons.
Why. One, because when we look at the life of the prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam, he would cut off his prayer. SallAllahu a Salam, if
he heard a baby crying, he would shorten the prayer. Why would he
do that? If the Prophet sallallahu, sallam, didn't want
mothers to attend with their children, because it's you know,
Mashallah. Rahman Center is an example of people feeling welcome
with their children, with their families. And you are all nodding
your heads. Masha Allah, this is a an amazing Institute for families,
for young children. And I've been another masjid, and maybe you have
where I've prayed, and afterwards, someone has stood up and screamed
at the top of their lungs and said, sisters, do not bring your
children here. If you're going to bring your kids here, they're
distracting everyone. Take hold of your children, control them. I've
been to a masjid in SoCal where an ammo? He stood up and he said,
sisters, if you could please volunteer who is going to watch
each other's children? It was during taraweeh, who is going to
watch the children so that they're not distracting everyone, so that
that way at least some of us can enjoy our salah. And this message
didn't have a barrier. So I raised my hand and I said, Why can't the
fathers just watch their own children as well? And he said, I
don't want to get involved in family issues.
The fact that women are expected to take care of the kids in the
masjid I've been in masajid, where men will drop their children off
in the women's section and go to the men's section and pray
there's no mother there. They're expecting women to just take care
of children. This is unacceptable. It is so against Islamic standard.
This is totally culture. But what message does that give to women
who grow up in the masjid, and compound that with hearing, it's
better for you not to be in the masjid. And compound that with
hearing it's better for children not to be in the masjid. Where do
we expect our children to be in the next generation? There's a
study done recently where 50% of women who grew up going to the
masjid do not come back, half American Muslims, half of the
community does not come back.
And honestly, I'm not surprised. I'm sure many of you are not
surprised, because we've experienced what that's like,
Alhamdulillah that we're here today, Alhamdulillah for a center
like this today, but we've lost so many in the messaging, just the
messaging, the architecture and the infrastructure. So when we
look at the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa sallam, why would he
shorten his prayer if he heard a baby crying? Abu Shukla mentions,
because he wanted mothers to know that they should keep coming back
to the masjid. So the Longhua are they? He will send them. Children
would pray. Would play on him while he's praying. He would hold
his granddaughter up when he's praying. And Imam pahani mentions,
because at the time. Now look, you're talking about a generation
where people have been taught for how long to bury their children of
life, to inherit their girls like property. Women were not given
rights. Now we have, all of a sudden, women are given rights,
and women do have a voice, and women are being listened to, and
women do have a critical role. So the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa
sallam is still dealing with a mentality that he is working to
actively shift. So when he's holding a baby up in prayer, Imam
takahani mentions that the reason is because he's showing by action
that the ignorance that you used to think about your daughters
about is not the case of Islam, because salah is the most sacred
space, and he's holding a little girl in the most sacred space,
sallAllahu, alayhi, wa sallam, when we're looking at the
infrastructure of the masjid, what did it look like there are
narrations? And by the way, anytime I say there are
narrations, I'm going to only tell you authentic narrations. When I
say there is discrepancy or it's a weak Hadith, I will tell you every
narration I'm mentioning is an authentic narration. And why
that's important is because you're always going to have ourselves
internally. We should always ask. We should always ask, is this
authentic? Where is it? And I have all the references, if you'd like.
I can give them to you. They're all here in the chapter that I
wrote for the book. So you're welcome to come and ask me
afterwards. I'm just not mentioning this, this thing, over
and over, because it becomes very technical. But these.
Are all authentic narrations where we're talking about the structure
of the masjid being that the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa
sallam would be in the front with men, that the children were in
between and that the women were in the back of the Masjid. Now let's
talk about a few reasons why. So Asmaa radiAllahu anha, she's the
daughter of Abu Bakr alahan. She mentions that the reason why women
were asked to keep their so there's a sorry, I should have
said this. There's a narration where women are asked to keep
their heads down a little bit longer in the Sajida before they
can't get up, and that when the prayer is done, that women should
get up and leave before the men do Do you so probably often, the
reason we're taught is because it's better for men and women not
to see each other. They shouldn't mix. They shouldn't mix. They
shouldn't talk. Okay, but Asmaa mentions, the reason, and the
reason is because some of the men companions were so poor, the only
cloth that they had to cover their bodies did not fully cover their
private part when they made sajda or when they were standing up,
they just didn't have the money to fully cover themselves. And so the
Prophet, sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam has a solution. What is the
solution? It's not women. Don't go to the masjid because you could
potentially see, literally, the private area of a man who you
would know it's very awkward. His solution, sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam is not to say we need to build a wall. And this is so crazy
to me. I've heard people say that, well, the Prophet saw them, didn't
build a wall because they didn't have the the means to build a
wall. We have military campaigns with Earthman RadiAllahu giving so
much, so much. If the Prophet saw them wanted to build a wall in a
masjid, they could have built a wall. Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam,
and so the Prophet, sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam, knowing that the
Companions don't have the means to fully cover themselves, all of
them. What does he do? He instructs women not to get up so
they don't accidentally see, and to leave faster, so when the men
are getting up, they don't accidentally see. Does this mean
they never spoke? No? Because we have narrations of women speaking
to men in the masjid. We have multiple narrations, and I'm going
to read some of them for you. Inshallah. So we have narrations
of men and women speaking in the masjid together. We have them
attending the sermon of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa salam
together. Um Hashem, the Tabitha, she mentions She memorized Surah
bah from the lips. She actually the hadith is so beautiful. I took
it from the mouth. I took it from the mouth of the prophet
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, that's how she memorized Surah
path, that she would go for salatul, Fajr, and she would go
for Jumaa. And the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam would
recite it so frequently, both in the prayer of Fajr and also in the
sermon the khutbah of Jamaat, that so many times to the point that
she actually memorized the surah. Took it from the mouth of the
prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. So we have narrations of
women speaking about how, excuse me, they learned Quran from the
Prophet sallallahu sallam, by what being present. They were present.
Also, Chef al Dani, who's a huge Hadith scholar, has a very
interesting statement. So he says that he's asked a question, he's
he's asked about the barrier, the wall and the message. And he says,
Sir, there's a Hadith of the Prophet saw them that the best of
rows for praying for women are in the back and the best of rows are
the worst rows are in the front, and the best rows for men are in
the front and the worst rows are in the back. Now let me tell you a
few narrations about this before I tell you about Danny's point.
Rahmatullah, are they? So there were a group of companions. This
is the sound narration in Ahmed that they walked into the masjid,
and there was a beautiful woman, and she would stand in the front
of the masjid. And I mentioned this narration a few months ago
when I came for the woman's lecture, she would stand in the
front of the masjid, and these young Companions would stand in
the back. And when they would make rukuwa, they would look at her,
and they would just like, wait and like, check her out more. Well,
the Allahu, I'm home. These are young people. They were young
people that have the Prophet too, sallAllahu, alayhi wa. And the
Prophet SAW solution was not to build a barrier. And so then irahi
mahola, when he's asked about now, if women are praying in another
room, does that change? Because is it still that the reward is better
for women in the back if they're in a separate room and men can't
even see them? Do you see, would it be better for women to pray in
the front? Albany responds by saying, well, you're assuming that
I agree with women being in a different room in the first place.
And then he talks about how it's a bid, how it's an innovation to
have women in a separate room or with a barrier, because it was not
something that the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam
himself had established in his community. And one of the Imams of
Mecca, Sheik, I think, is Cal Dani. Cal Dani, but I need to
double check his name. I can read it for you inshallah in a second.
But he's also asked about this. He says something very similar, and
then he says that there's so much fear about women that it's led to
rulings that have to do with making women separate from men.
Now I am not saying that the barrier is a bit dark. I'm not
saying that. I'm just quoting Shah and probably many scholars you ask
would never say this either.
It because it's not he's he sees, he sees it as something new that
the Prophet saw them didn't bring and his solution. He says that
you're bringing the solution to the partition because you're
saying, and I'm paraphrasing his words, that you're saying that
people are so far astray in their dress and their behavior from the
time the Prophet fully send them that we have to segregate them. He
says, the solution is not segregation, the solution is
training. The solution is building. The solution is
teaching, so that we go back to the lifestyle and the interactions
and the dress and the way of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam, the solution of segregation, it's building people,
and that is a solution, and keep the method of the Prophet
sallallahu a Salam. But other scholars are not going to agree
with this 100% or not. They're 100% going to say that it's
actually done out of protection. And also, let's be honest, as
women, sometimes it's nice to have a place where you can just lie
down and you don't have to worry. If, for a woman who are in a club,
it's nice to take off your NiP. For women who have young kids,
it's nice to let them run in the women's section, if there are
other kids and they're running with women and no one is praying,
and you can just have that space. So sometimes it's nice to have a
separate room, but it's also nice to have the option of praying
behind the men. For those women who also want that. I've walked
into Masjid that don't have a screen that you can't access them
inside, and they're saying, Allahu, Akbar. What? What count
are they on? I don't know. Has it happened to you before? I have
many times, and you are not. Many of you're nodding your heads. I
start. I'm like, Allahu. Akbar, okay, maybe they're about to make
Adam al says that, and I'm not in the same position. And then they
find out, like three Allahu. Akbar, later, when they say, Send
me Allahu, even Hamidah, I'm like, Oh, I wasn't even in the same
Raqqa. So Shaykh Mandy, what makes this point? Sometimes your prayer
is literally Baltimore. It's not even counted with the Jama with
the congregation, because you don't even see what they're doing.
You don't know, no clue. How can we say that is more acceptable,
that our prayer as women is not as acceptable, or it's not as
important, or it's not as critical as men, because we just need to be
in a separate area. And again, I have nothing against a separate
area. I'm telling you so many benefits of the separate area, but
at least have a tool so that women know where we are. In my masjid,
many times the mic would go out, especially in PM, PM. In my
masjid, growing up, the Imam would recite like surayam, suratoha,
surah and Biya, and then say, Allahu, Akbar, then his mic would
go off. Do we know what's happening? No. Can we see them?
Absolutely not. The only reason we know that he has finished ru after
we've been there for 10 minutes is because we hear sort of Fatiha
again, what happened to all of our prayer? Literally, what happens to
all of our prayer. Is that fair? So why would Allah make the masjid
a place that's inaccessible for women,
because he sees our prayer as not as important as men. We absolutely
our prayer is as important as men. And it brings me so much sadness
when I get messages from young women and elderly women, women who
are in their 60s and women who are in their teens, women who are in
their 20s and women who are in their 50s, and all of them have
the exact same question, Does Allah really care about me because
I'm a woman, like, I make dua, but I think he doesn't like to hear my
voice in the first place. I go to the masjid, but I know he doesn't
want me there. Like, what are we teaching women about Allah? 50%
of women are leaving this Majin. What do we think is going to
happen to Islam in the next generation when we do not care
more for women? The fitna of a potential man, one potential man,
seeing one potential woman and going crazy by her presence is so
much greater than all of women's Iman combined. La ilaha, illallah,
I don't know how we're going to come to Allah. So when we look at
the community of the Prophet sallallahu, a seven what we see is
that the accessibility for women was a priority, and when we're
talking about the issue of women being seen, who knows what the
greatest jihad is for a woman? It's a beautiful
jihad, and it definitely feels like one for many of us. Masha,
Allah, may Allah bless our families. But that's not the
Hadith. Another one,
going for Hajj and Amra. The greatest jihad for a woman, which,
as we spoke about in the last session, women absolutely attended
battles. They were warriors on the battlefield. They participated in
taking care of the wounded as well. But the greatest jihad for
women is Hajj and Amra. And if you've made Hajj or Amra, have any
of you made Hajj or Amra? Yeah, okay. Did you feel like it was
difficult, especially Hajj specifically? Yeah, I literally
remember thinking of the Hadith while I was making Hajj. I was
like, Oh, the Papa, so seven said this was jihad for women. It's so
true. It was so hard. In the beginning of a Hajj, I made JOA,
like, literally, I was in Medina before Mecca. Oh no, please, let
me come for hedge every year. Let me come for hedge every year. In
the middle of hedge, like, a week later, I was like, ya, Allah, I
don't know
it was so hard and that okay, that's just personal. I'm not
saying that's all women's experiences. Maybe you went for
hedge and it.
So easy in hamta Deva, but in general,
Hajj is the jihad of women. And of course, in addition to UK, the
Women campaign is meant for jihad as well. But I should all be a lot
more anha. She wanted to go for Hajj over and over. She made
multiple head multiple Hajj after the promise of some passed away
because of this hadith, specifically because of this
hadith, she kept going back for Hajj. Now,
are you going to see men in Hajj?
Are men going to see you in hedge? A lot? Are you probably going to
like touch men? Are you maybe even going to pray next to men? Hajj is
a ton of people. You cannot control the crowds of hedge.
There's literally no way you can control it. So why would the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa salam say that the best form jihad is
like the best type of action? Why would he tell women that the best
type of action is to make jihad if the issue itself was that women
are going to be exposing men to the fitna of them? Do you see what
I'm saying? Yes, there is absolutely protections in place in
Islam so that men and women interact with one another, with
professionalism, with integrity, with care for one another, with
the brotherly, sisterly interaction that Islam has a
spirit for. That is that that building, that establishment,
building that love for one another, caring for one another,
that is built through all of the guidelines that Allah has set in
place, that were never alone in a room, and that doesn't mean a room
with windows. It means like in a room alone with absolutely no one
that can hear you, that can see you, an elevator doesn't count.
It's just a few minutes, people can walk in and out. We are never
completely alone, consistently with someone, because that could
lead to something over time. Absolutely, we have the rulings on
hijab and interacting and all of those things for a reason that all
goes back to building a society on professionalism and care and
consideration and brother and sister love Brother Li and sister
Lila. That is very different from saying that the reason women were
hijab is to protect men from our existence. That is very different
from saying that the reason that women should not go to the masjid
is to protect men from our existence. And that is the message
that, unfortunately, I have grown appearing, and it seems like, from
your nodding of head, some of you have grown appearing, and the
messages that I'm still receiving from women today are still growing
up hearing that puts the onus of responsibility even when a woman
deals with a lot of issues that I'm not going to go into today,
because this wasn't the topic, and I don't want to go into issues
without warnings. But a lot of times, even in those
circumstances, women are still the ones who are held responsible, and
that is not Islamic law. So looking at the time of the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi was sent them, sometimes people say, Well, the
reason that the Prophet sallallahu alayhi was sent them was allowing
for women to go to the masjid was because it was a more pious
society, right? Have you heard this? The women were more pious.
The men were more pious. They were dressing appropriately. They were
interacting appropriately. They didn't speak in inappropriate
ways. Their piety was so much greater, and that is why there's a
statement of Aisha while the Allahu anha. Does anyone know the
statement of Aisha about the Masjid?
What is the statement
can you say on the mic? Because I don't I could barely hear you. I
don't think in the back
they can hear you. The Prophet knew how the women of this time
were basically or that that time after that, how they recognized
him, how they were acting about
the Prophet, exactly swallow. Are they ascendant? The ayuduan has
said, now this is her time period. It's not that far away from the
Prophet saw them, that if the prophet saw them knew, like the
state of women today, that he would have prevented women from
going to the message. Right? I've heard this hadith, the statement
of Aisha Aldi lapuan, who used so many times to talk about why women
that was the time of Aisha. Imagine today. Imagine today.
Women should not go to the masjid because it's so much further. Look
at what women are doing today in comparison. But let's talk about a
few things. Number one,
let me see what ages we have. Do we have very young kids? We do?
Okay, I'm
just going to say
agreed upon situations. Do you understand what I'm saying? Agreed
upon situations happened in the time of the Prophet, sallAllahu,
alayhi wa salam from companions, agreed upon situations. Does that
make sense? What I'm saying that happened in the time the Prophet
saw someone forced unagreed upon situation happened in the time of
the Prophet salallahu alayhi wa salam. Does that make sense? That
happened in the society of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam, alcoholics happened in the time of the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam. Crime happened in the time of the Prophet
salallahu alayhi wa sallam. Are these all things that happened
today?
Yes. So what is it that happened in the time of Aisha radiAllahu
anha, that wasn't happening in the time of the Prophet sallallahu,
Salam Ibn Hazm says, we don't know what the issue was. We don't know
what it was that was so different, because those things that I just
mentioned were happening already, and they're happening today. What
was it that was different that Aisha radila was talking about? We
don't know. First of all, second of all, she didn't say that the
woman themselves should not go. She didn't say that. She didn't
even tell the woman not to go. She said if the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam had seen it, that he would have stopped them from
going. And if it hasn't, has this very funny statement. I actually
want to read it too. It's very funny. I like actually laughed out
loud when I read it. So
his statement is
okay, and we do not know of a sillier argument than the argument
of the one who argues by someone saying, had such and such been
then such and such would have been to make an obligation. What has
not been the thing that had it been then that other one also
would have been.
It's, yes, it's like you have trouble following along because
you have trouble following along the mentality in the first place.
Why would you prevent all women? And this is what another scholar
mentions, why would you prevent all women from attending the
Masjid? If there's one or two women who don't go to the masjid,
I mean, who are doing this action which is not appropriate for the
masjid. And let me tell you, there was this case. There's a case
study
during the time of Ibn hazrami. He's one of the huge scholars of
the Shafi imadham. There was a scholar in his time. His name is
Ibn Abdul alafa. In Mecca, women would love to go to the masjid,
the Kaaba, Masjid, Al haram. They would love to go. And they would
go, especially after salatul Asha, it's hot and mas in Mecca, they
would go after Aisha, it was cooler. They would spend their
time making FOAF and making the KR and sitting in their own place and
reading Quran.
Now, there was a political issue where they decided to ban women
from going to mashallah, especially after Asha, after Isha,
they decided to ban women. So can you imagine Mecca that women
specifically were not allowed to keep going. And what was the
reasoning? Because there are so many women and men in corners
doing things now, I want you to imagine like
Mecca.
Can you imagine that being in the corners of mesh al haram, they
couldn't go to any other part of the city, like in front of the
Kaaba so IBM, he says, Who, who, where, where, where, who, which,
which woman, which, where are the how many times has this happened?
Who are the people where this happened? How are you going to
make an entire ruling by the point of there could be some women that
could do this. And therefore, instead of acknowledging the fact
that in order to do this, they need men to do it too, we're going
to ban all women from going and so there was a time period in Mecca
where the guards of Masjid Al haram, whether it was a young
woman or a elderly grandmother, they would forcibly push women out
of the masjid because there was a ruling that women shouldn't
attend. Who was allowed to go though? Who which women were
allowed to go when they would meet the guards, and the guards would
say, you're not allowed to be here. Who was it that was allowed
the daughters and the wives of the politicians of the city?
Does that mean it's an Islamically appropriate ruling? Or does that
mean? Sometimes there are circumstances where rulings are
made that are not necessarily based in Islamic law, but are
based in some other reality, which today we can look back at case
studies and we can see what happened and that the opinion was
shifted once Ibn Abdul lafar made these issues, and he actually
wrote to scholars in other in other countries, he wrote to Moses
in other countries. Is this appropriate to do for the women of
Mecca? And they wrote back, saying no, and the ruling was overturned,
and then women were allowed to go again. But we don't have enough
context to understand the context of why the ruling was made in the
first place. All we have are his writings. So if he hadn't written
about the situation, we wouldn't even know that. We would just know
for a time period it was so bad in Mecca, women were going wild in
Mecca that women were prevented from going to the Kaba because of
this. Do you understand what that means? That when they actually
looked into it, there were no tangible incidences that they
could point two. So when we're talking about filth and Islamic
law, we have amazing scholars, and we talked about last time in the
last session. I'm sorry I keep saying last session, because for
those of you who are coming again, I don't want this to be repetitive
for you, but for those of you who maybe this is the first time, a
quick point, women scholars have been part of this ummah for
centuries. The.
Have taught the men of this ummah, the men that we quote all the
time, they women were their teachers. So if we are not going
to look at the context for why rulings were made, we're not going
to understand the reasoning for why rulings were made, we can
easily have someone in a message in California or Kentucky or
anywhere in the world point to a book and say, well, this huge
scholar of Shafiq held that position, and he's a huge scholar,
and we should establish that position today. Does that make
make sense? Why we need to understand the context for why it
was made in the first place?
Subhanallah, when we look at the time of the Prophet sallallahu,
alayhi wa salam, what we see is not said of the Royal which is the
blocking of means. We see fetz Araya, which is the opening of the
means this is why we have so many narrations of women actively
attending the masjid. And I'd like to spend a minute reading to you
some of those narrations. And they're women whose names you're
probably familiar with, who you've like, maybe not heard them being
in the masjid before, but this
so we have Ayesha. She narrates the sun eclipsed during the
lifetime of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Then I came and
entered the masjid and saw the Messenger of Allah, sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam, standing up in prayer. And so she talks about how
he she joined the Prophet, peace be upon Him in prayer. And it was
a very long prayer, and she got very tired, and then she noticed
there was a woman who was much older than her, and she was much
less, like, physically strong than her, and she's still standing and
she's still praying, and so I should Allah was like, if she's
doing it, I can keep doing it. So she kept on praying. This is a
mother of the believer, and she was there, and she continued to
pray. One time the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasalam entered
a masjid, and he between two pillars, he saw a rope, and he
asked what the rope was for. And they said it was for Zainab Aloha.
And had that when she gets very tired, she uses the rope to keep
keep up in Salah. Now, his reaction was not, it's better for
her to pray at home in the first place, put a put a rope in your
home. Do you like? Do you like? Can you imagine? I don't know. Why
I keep saying, do you understand? I don't know. I keep saying that.
Sorry. It's like something that I've developed in this lecture. Do
you understand what that means, a rope in the masjid? So like, she
has this rope in the masjid, and she has put a rope, and people
know that zainabs rope. Like, imagine leaving a rope on the
like, column of Rama center, and then someone coming be like,
what's this rope for? It's like, oh, when, when you know someone
comes in and they use this to keep up their salah, they're probably
gonna be like, can you just take it down? Like, why is it like, you
need permission? Like, why do you have that? But the Prophet
sallallahu didn't tell her, it's better to pray at home, or it's
better not to have a rope, or you're disturbing the masjid, the
Prophet saw them, told her this, no, remove the rope. Why? One
should pray as their energy permits. And when you get tired,
sit down.
Span of love, solution. Sit down. If you're tired, when you're
praying, keep praying. Just sit down. Faulty weapons place. Had
recently lost her husband in a battle, and after she later on,
after the waiting period, she heard the call, she went to the
masjid and she prayed there. And she narrates, I was in the row of
the woman when the messenger of God finished his prayer. So the
lower the he sat on the pulpit, and he was smiling. Then he said,
Let everyone remain in his or her place. Then he asked, Do you know
why I have gathered you? They said, God and His Messenger know
best, salawats. And then he said, I have gathered you because Tammy
maddadi, who was a Christian, came pledged allegiance and embraced
Islam and told me a story which confirms what I have been telling
you about, the Antichrist. So this, this new convert, comes to
the masjid, and as a Christian, he tells the Prophet, sallAllahu
sallam, something that the Prophet SAW had been teaching the
believers but did not maybe was, I don't know the Prophet, I don't
know that the extent of if he hadn't been told that this was in
the narration, or what I don't know, but he's confirming from
Christian sources. What the Prophet SAW is being taught by
Allah. And we know that early Christianity, the teachings were
the same from the same the same source. And so the Prophet Islam
is now saying this person coming from Christianity, let me tell you
who's narrating this hadith. It's faulty man. That's why we have
this hadith. Because faulty model, the * was there narrating the
Hadith.
In another narration, the Prophet saw them, saw spit on the walls of
the masjid, and that made him angry. Does he spit on the walls?
And we all know, like the narration of the companion who
came in and urinated in the masjid, right? We've heard this
narration. A Bedouin came and he said, that says, salaam, papasala
salam. And I love this narrative. Is so cute. He goes to the
bathroom, and the companions were so angry. And the Prophet saws
like, just let him finish. And do you know what the this Bedouin
said to the Prophet sallallahu sallam? He says that he wants
Allah to have mercy on you. To the Prophet sallallahu Sallam and me
to himself, and nobody else. And then the Prophet SAW, says, You've
tried to make something so vast, like, you've tried to, like,
constrict something that's so vast you can't constrict the mercy of
Allah to me and you and nobody else, sallAllahu, alayhi wa
sallam. But this is the behavior. They're Bedouins. Sometimes
they're people who are getting used to a structure of the masjid
that's just their lifestyle. So someone spits on the wall of the
masjid, and the Prophet SAW becomes upset, and then what a
woman from the Ansar said to him, oh, sorry. The a woman from the.
Stood up, walked to it, rubbed it off, and put some perfume on the
wall instead. And the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa salam said,
how beautiful this is, how beautiful this is.
And we know about the mehrab. Some of you have heard the story of the
woman who of the tree that the pastor Salam used to give the
from, or just give sermons. And then they built a bigger min and
then the tree was crying. The Prophet saw some, you know, came
and consoled it. The Prophet saw them. Had that minbar be built?
Because of this narration, one day, a woman came to from the
unsold came and said, a messenger of Allah, one of my servants is a
carpenter. Shall I get him to construct a construct a pulpit for
you? The Prophet responded, yes, she did. And the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam started using the pulpit, the
pulpit, the pulpit, that pulpit is because of a woman companion who
asked the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and took action
about it, like these special stories, these many stories, like
growing up with them, seeing the masjid and knowing that, like this
is the role of women in the masjid they created with the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. For me, at least, it just gives me a
different type of connection to the woman companions and my place
in the masjid as well. And then we have Asmaa biz Abu Bakr, who it
says that she went to the Eclipse prayer of the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam. So basically the Eclipse prayer is a super long
prayer. And she was praying the super, super long prayer. And then
she describes it, and she says, On the completion of the prayer, he
said, Paradise became so near to me that if I had dared, I would
have plucked one of its bunches for you. And * became so near
to me that said, Oh, my Lord, will I be amongst those people? Then
suddenly I saw a woman, and a cat was lacerating her with its claws
on inquiring. It was said that the woman had imprisoned the cat until
it died of starvation, and she neither fed it nor freed it so
that it could feed itself. So the Prophet saw that was praying the
super long prayer that Asmaa is part of, and then she narrates
that. He's explaining that this woman was basically punished over
and over because She tortured a cat. We have that narrate. And I'm
sure you've heard of the cat story. Many of you have heard of
the cast story before. We have that narration from Asmaa odiloha
Because she was present in the masjid and the Eclipse prayer. The
Eclipse prayer is an extra prayer. It's not one of the five. She
didn't have to go for an extra prayer too, a super long one, but
she chose to another woman were there with her as well. There's
another narration of a woman who lived in the masjid. So we have
ethno suffr They are men and women who used to live in the masjid.
They couldn't afford anything. They used to live there. And when
living there, there was a woman who would live in the masjid, and
do you know what she was not told? She was not told leave when you're
on your menses. She was not told leave. Because if you live here
and men here live here. God knows what will happen. She just lived
there like a normal human being and other normal human beings,
healthy stayed in the masjid, and they lived there, obviously, in
their own living quarters and all of that. But the point is, she was
there. Rodi Allahu, aha Asmaa Binti Yazid mentioned that the
Messenger of Allah, sallAllahu, alayhi wa sallam, passed through
the masjid one day, and there were a group of women, about 10 of
them, sitting in the masjid. And he raised his hand to offer
greetings, sallAllahu Isma. So he's just passing a group of women
hanging out in the masjid. They're just hanging out. And he doesn't
say, Why are you hanging out here? For no reason, sallAllahu. So he
doesn't say, you know, if any men come in, you should really leave.
I mean, we could assume maybe, what if there were no men? What if
there were no men? He could have told them, and he would have had
to tell them, because he's a Prophet, sallAllahu alayhi was up.
He has to give the rulings. He could have told them leave. When
you see a man walk in. No What did he do? Just said, sit down.
Salawat. He would tell them. So we have all these narrations of women
in the masjid, and we have narrations of our scholars whose
mothers were attached to the masjid. So, for example, I know
you've heard of I'm not. I don't know. I'm I'm assuming you've
heard of some of the stories, like Imam Ahmed, how his mother would
take him to the masjid from such a young age that we have these
scholars, the greatest scholars of our history, whose mothers were
attached to the masjid. I'm going to bring them to the masjid. And
we have this incident and miss a and he mentions that. So he was
one of the early scholars, the early scholars of Sofia, Sofia and
Ibn arayana and other scholars talk about him as like the best of
us. He was the best of us. He was always thinking about Allah,
always weeping and always being close to to Allah. And he would go
with his mom to the masjid to and she would, he would carry her
prayer mat. So he was just carrying her prayer mat, and they
would get to the masjid, and then he would put that prayer mat down
for his mom and set it out. And then she would start praying. And
then he would go to the front of the masjid and he would pray, and
then he would teach his classes from there. And when he was done,
they would go back to the house together. Isn't that so sweet. We
have all of these like incidences of scholars going to the masjid
with their mothers, serving their mothers as they come to the masjid
scholar. His mother helped him to be a scholar. He could have said,
Mom, now that you've taught me it's better for you not to come in
the first place. If these are scholars who know the rulings, why
wouldn't they advise their mothers that way? Why wouldn't they advise
their mothers because they care about their mothers. It's not
because they want to prevent women than.
Shit is they care about the AF, you know, of their mom. So they
would say, Mom, like, I love you, but like, you know it's better now
you don't. I don't need you to walk me anymore. I'm a young man
now. I can do it on my own, but she would still come, and he would
still be with her when she was coming. And there's another part
that I'd like to talk about, which is a little bit different from the
general attendance of the masjid, but it's decaf. Does anyone know
about it? Cap, has anyone made it? Cap, here, no, yes, you made
ftcap. How was the experience for you, making artsycat? Oh, sorry.
Can we get the mic again? Where did you go? Thank you. Thank you
so much. We would
attend like the Iftar there, and
so then there was a group of ladies. They said, What if we did
the join us? So there were quite a few.
And it was really very wise. Started reading that and of
course, we would sleep a little after
that, in the morning, in
the morning time, and then, even larger, today. And it was really
nice to see that, you know,
people would break up outside, break food for you, and bring all
the sharks
people are taking care of you,
and we have nothing to do.
I think I did
two twice, I think twice or twice, we were deviated after. And it was
really very similar to the heart, and it was like you were aware,
you know, you were totally out of the world, you know, connected to
the world at all, you know. And then, of course, the day we had to
go and take a shower or something. There was a little, very small
place, but there was a very good friend of ours who came close by
to go to our house,
just focused and
come back.
That is so beautiful.
I think that is a really nice way to really feel the spirit of, you
know, yes,
yes, yes, SubhanAllah. And the way you described it was very
spiritual. Your description of it was very spiritual. I'm sure many
of us, I definitely felt this way, not seeing other people nod that
it felt like your spirit, like was in the masjid, just being there
like it kind of made me want to yearn for doing the same thing.
And just you don't have to worry about anything. You just focus on
your worship, and that's it. That's all you're doing. Just
worshiping
your
own right. Gave you
the effect
of the Ramadan? Yes, it so impacts your Ramadan, the Ramadan feeling
that we all like crave you. You experience it more when you're
living in the masjid Absolutely. Does that look a thank you for
sharing that. Does anyone else want to share an IT? Caf
experience?
Okay, raise your hand if you've made your Etsy Caf before. Raise
it really high. Just so we see so we have one sister.
Two.
Okay, two, so three, no one else has made artsy calf before. For
those of you who the majority have not made artsy calf, can you tell
me why you've never made artsy calf?
Yes,
sure. I want to be four kids.
Oh, okay, so just a personal you didn't go into
it. Oh, yeah, that's right.
So hard at home,
of course, can take a shower when you're home.
Yeah,
yeah, exactly Panama, thank you for sharing that it's very hard to
make her anti caf at home. Yes, anyone else who hasn't made it to
calf the reason why so, one, just it's busy. Two, environment wasn't
like encouraging of that or set up for that structure. Anyone else?
Nobody,
yes.
Oh yeah, that's a big one. Women just don't know that we can make
artsy calf and that it's encouraged for a woman to make
artsycat Absolutely, absolutely. When I was
16, I wanted to make artsy cat for the first time. And have to know
my parents. I'm so grateful. My parents were always so supportive.
Like, anything I wanted to do, it was like, of course you need to
you're a woman. Like, it was like, Dad, I really want to be a
scholar. Of course you need to be. We need more women scholars. Like,
I really want to go to the message at three. Of course you should.
And I feel so great.
Because when I told my friends that I'm gonna make artsy calf,
they were like, what, our parents would never let us make artsy
calf. Like, you're gonna sleep over in the masjid. And I was
like, yeah, they were like, our parents would never let us do
that. And it, it was such a like, I didn't realize how my parents
would allow me to do things. That's how many of my friends
religiously. Obviously, I wasn't really that into religion at all.
And then I got into it. And then I was like, Wait, religious parents
don't let you do. These are religious things. Why wouldn't
they let you do? We're not going partying like they're not gonna
let you do that. So I brought all my stuff to the masjid. I'm so
excited. I had, like, my sleeping bag and my little overnight bag,
and this was the winter time. Oh, my favorite time. It's been so
long since Ramadan was in the winter, but Subhanallah, it was so
cold and the nights were very long, so no one was staying in the
masjid at this time. It was like me and three other women, and
until today, we're like the anti Caf group. I don't still make anti
caf with them, because I had children, and Hamdan was very
hard. I mean, I still can go. It's just so much harder. Hamdulillah,
I'm very fortunate they have the support that I can if I want to,
but it's not easy. It's different. And so, I mean, you still have,
like, so much responsibility during the day and working like
now I'm working. It's just not the same as when I was 16. So and
winter break, because winter break high schooler, I'm so excited. And
then this Auntie from the masjid sees me, and they know this on TV.
And she comes to me and she says, Why do you have a sleeping bag?
And I'm like, because I'm gonna make a tic half on TV. I'm gonna
make a tikaf. And by the way, like I was not into Islam at all the
year before. So this is, like, a huge change for me, and she knows
this. She has seen that growth. So this is why so important to have
mentors who are aware of your circumstance. So she sees me and
she's like, No, and I was like, what? And she's like, You are a
young girl, and this is not acceptable for women.
Now I don't know what's right and wrong, and my parents are very
supportive and amazing, but they're not scholars of Islam, and
so I'm like, did my parents say I can do something that I'm not
allowed to do, and I don't know what to do? So my dad calls a
scholar that he knows, and the scholar that he knows says, of
course, it's fine for women to go for Etsy calf. It's absolutely
acceptable. And why that experience was so important. It's
my formative Islamic years when I really started finding my Islamic
identity. Was, like you said, public high school. I'm surrounded
by nothing that's encouraging me to pray and fast. I'm surrounded
by everything else. The anti cap was so grounding for my Islamic
identity. It was sitting in a message and doing nothing but
praying and reading the Quran. I'm that sweetness. I had never felt
it until that experience like, Oh my God, I want this. I want this
every day. I want this relationship. And what can I do to
maintain this relationship? And especially for women, I mean, men
and women as we grow older, it doesn't matter. You know, men and
men or women growing older, you have other responsibilities. Also.
Your body aches differently. It's not that easy to just spend all
the day in the masjid, every single day, to be able to take
advantage of that as a young person, as a gift, and to have a
woman who saw me not caring about Islam at all and questioning
whether or not I wanted to be Muslim to the next year being like
I want to make artsy cap for her reaction. To say, as a woman, it's
better for you not to do this really speaks to how she was
trained and how she was taught, is that herself? Because we have
narrations of the woman companions making artsy calf. And when I went
to mesh Al Aqsa pan a lot there national in Ramadan is tents
everywhere outside, tents just like camping, tents everywhere.
People just make our tea cab in these tents outside. And then they
go to the bathrooms in equal to they like, you know, they have all
their stuff there, but they're living in tents. And there's like,
an area where most of the men do it, there's an area where most of
the women do it. But Masto is an enormous compound. It's a
humongous outdoor compound. And I'm not trying to, like, plug my
social media here, but if you want to see a video of it, if you check
the Miriam Amir, T H, E, M, A R, Y, a m, a m, I, R V. Maryam Amir
on Instagram or tick tock or YouTube, and I actually put it up
on Facebook too. It's just my name I want. The reason I'm telling you
this is because it's a video of the entirety of the compound.
There are five mus in meshulks, so I'm sure you've heard of Dome of
the Rock. And then there's Ghibli, which is typically what people
say. I'm sure you've heard like, don't move the rock. That's not
the real Masjid Al Aqsa, that Masjid Al Aqsa, no, that's not
true. It is all Masjid Al Aqsa, the entire compound is blessed.
The entire compound is where the prophets and the angels have
walked and prayed, where the there's not a single place where
the angel, excuse me, where Prophet hasn't prayed or an angel
has not stood, not a single spot of it. That entirety of that area,
in the supportive for us to know that, because, yes, there's a
concentrated effort to take it away from us, and if we only care
about one masjid, it makes it a lot easier for us to say, Oh, it's
okay. That's not the real Masjid. Absolutely not. It is all
Mashallah. So women typically stay in Kupu to Sukh, which is the dam
of the rock, and men typically stay in Mashallah.
Which is the front one that you typically hear, it's me, and then
on the side there's meshed marwani. So interesting in that
video, if you see it maswani, it was full of dirt and trees. I
mean, I wish I could show you a picture. I don't think you're
gonna be able to see it from, like, all the distance, but like,
imagine a subterranean Masjid. So you have to go down, like, if you
go into a subway, and you have to go down a bunch of stairs to get
to get to the subway. Imagine that whole stair area was covered with
dirt and trees. You wouldn't know there's anything down there, but
Subhanallah, they excavated it out, and they found this huge
masjid, and they knew it was there for a couple of reasons. In the
19, excuse me, in the 1920s the British closed that Masjid down.
They said that they said that they just closed it down. So it was
closed and they weren't able to access it anymore. And so it
started to build up like land has just started to accumulate. But on
the outside, the walls and vessel ups on the outside, sorry, yeah,
on the walls of industrial on the outside, you can see that there's
windows. So even though they couldn't see what was inside
because of the walls and the dirt and everything. They knew
something was in there. And the Crusaders used to keep it as horse
stables. So if you went into marwani, so one of our tour guides
said, when he was a kid, he's in his 50s now, when he was a kid, he
helped with going, no he said they went on a field trip because it
was in the 90s that they did the excavation, but they went on a
field trip, and he said it smelled like horses from the time of the
Crusaders, because it hasn't been accessible, so it still smelled
like horses. And now they've turned it, they there's
bulldozers. They took out all of the dirt and all of the ground,
and now Masha Allah is just, you take stairs and you go in. Is this
enormous, beautiful Masjid. That's where it's said that the mehrab of
Maryam Ali has Salam is and where the mehrab or zakirya would visit
Maria Maliha Sadam, there's discrepancy on whether or not
that's authentic. They would have been in the whole entire place in
general, in any way. So I'm sure they would have been in the first
place. But the point is, women often take that area as a place
that they make our anticath. So that's often the woman's area for
anticav as well as the dam of the rock. And the men often go to
klipili. And then there's another two Masjid Rahma. Mas Rahma. Women
have one section. Men have one section in pura. I don't know who
does Arti, Kaf, I didn't see it there. But the point is that you
still see women today in the holiest space and mash also the
third holiest site of istanb, making her anticaf. And I want to
read to you a narration of the women companions.
Aisha radiah mentioned that she used to pitch a tent in the last
10 nights of Ramadan for the Prophet sallallahu alayhi. He was
someone he would make anticathma message. He would enter after
offering a federal prayer. Hafsah radiAllahu anha asked for the
permission of Aisha to pinch a tent for herself, and Aisha
allowed her. So Hafsah pitched a tent. When Zaynab radiAllahu anha
saw it, she pitched another tent in the morning. The Prophet Phil
noticed the tents. He commented, do you think that they intended to
do righteousness by doing this? And Dr abutton says, according to
scholars, this question means, is the real purpose of pitching these
tents devotion and worship, or is it only a matter of rivalry and
competition, because they were the Mothers of the Believers, and they
often competed against one another, and so the pastoral
Psalms like, do they really want, we're into worship, or are they
trying to like outdo one another? Do you see? No, he's saying, Did
he say, Don't do it? Did he say, don't make our tikaf? These are
the Mothers of the Believers. He is the most righteous woman of our
entire ummah. SubhanAllah. What was their action? They would make
our Tikka for the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa sallam, as a
described ayeshala, used to retreat to retreat to the masjid
or tikaf During the last 10 days of Ramadan, until he passed away.
Thereafter, his wives were retreated in the masjid during the
last 10 nights of Ramadan after him.
Oh, sorry, I thought you were asking a question.
So the point is that we have these narrations of the Mothers of the
Believers themselves, going and making our tikkap and being a part
of the masjid space, whether it was for regular salah, or whether
it was to sleep there, whether it was to help with the architecture
and the infrastructure of the masjid, or whether it was because
they just wanted to pray. And that has continued over time. We have
Ibn Al Josi mentioning in mashallah that he would see women
and they would make our anti calf. And they were so devoted to making
our anti calf. This is centuries after the Prophet sallallahu, they
would send up, and he would see women in the Dome of the Rock
wearing there's another narration describing their clothing being
like this coarse wool. And there's another description of women from
a different person who mentioned that he saw a woman who would just
stay there with their spindles, like they would do their sewing
and stuff like that in the masjid. They would just hang out in the
masjid and do this sewing. And there's also a funny narration of
a woman in another and another masjid, and this man goes up to
her and in these messy it's interesting because there is a
comparative study that Marion Katz did for her PhD. She did a
comparison of Aksa and Syria and Iran. And I think it was two other
places where she looked at historical documents of women's
attendance in the masjid at this time, and then none of them were
there barriers in Well, never mind. It's a long story. The point
is that one of the narrations that she mentions is a woman who
existed hundreds of years ago, but Subhanallah, we have her narration
of being in the masjid, and this man.
Sees her, and she's making such death, and she's going up. And
then he tells her, you woman, you come here, and I see you with your
rear ends in the air.
And she says to him, put dust in your eyes and don't look
that was somebody. So he responds, and he says, I can't help but
look, now, I can't help but look, is that her problem? No, it's not.
It's his problem. Maybe he should not walk to the woman's side.
Maybe he should not, you know, if to save his own Eman, maybe he
needs to consider different prayer opportunities for himself. It
doesn't mean that women should be obstructed, but I will say that,
like the incident we talked about, where there was a companion, the
companion who would look under and see the woman, if we heard that
today, and that man went to the masjid board, not this Masjid
board, but went to a different masjid and said the women are
distracting the men from praying. And he just said, the men. And he
didn't say myself. He said there are men because he's embarrassed
to talk about his stuff. There are men who come and they see women in
sajda, and they can't help but thinking unholy thoughts about
women in the masjid. So we shouldn't allow women to pray in a
place where men can see them. Can you realistically assume that
there could be some masajid that would say, let's make sure women
are not praying in the same homeless men? Yeah. And is that
really woman's problem, or is it one man who had an issue who needs
to work on it. He had a muddled in his heart, as the Quran describes
a model a disease in his heart, and as Sheik hadraniti mentions,
we should make to offer his cure. We don't need to change policy. We
can make to offer his cure. The point of today, I hope, in sha
Allah, is to describe that woman's presence in the masjid was really
part of the community of the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa
sallam. There is a difference of opinion on whether or not it's
better for a woman to pray at home or the Masjid. The majority
opinion is that it's better for women to pray at home. That is the
vast majority of scholars, from the vast majority of Madame, there
is a minority opinion that looks at the same evidences, looks at
whether or not the authenticity is authentic, and looks at the action
of the women believers, of the companions, and looks at the
action of the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wa sallam, and looks at
that and comes to the ruling of it being better for a Woman to pray
in the masjid, except if she decides she needs to stay at home
to take care of her kids or to take care of her responsibilities,
then it's rewarded for her to stay at home. And neither ruling is
intended to put hardship on a woman. It is intended to in
facilitate her worship while recognizing the different
realities that she has in her life and the different commitments that
she has so.