Mohammad Elshinawy – When a Hadith Seems Tough on Women

			Salam aleikum wa rahmatullah wa barakato. Bismillah Alhamdulillah wa salatu salam ala rasulillah
Allah He was a huge marine within the name of Allah. Well praise and glory be to Allah and mais
finest peace and blessings be upon us messenger Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and his family
and his companions and all those who tried his path may Allah azza wa jal grant us and He will life
upon his pet path, and the death upon his guidance and a reunion around him alone. I mean, may Allah
illuminate our minds and yours with the Quran and fill our days with the guidance in following the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and fill our hearts with love for Allah and for his messenger
		

			and for the believers and mercy and compassion and justice to be extended out of our hearts for the
entire creation of Allah azza wa jal aloha mermin. So I just wanted to share a few thoughts this
evening. regarding a question that
		

			is very common actually, that a sister posed to me about how she should understand or process or
even explain to others in an appropriate fashion.
		

			The idea the statements of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, the prophetic traditions that
appear to be tough on
		

			on women. And so many times ahaadeeth are cited and they are perceived or some people claim that
they are disadvantaging women they are prejudice against women or otherwise. So I'm gonna try to
share four points to help us unlock some of these contentions and see past them be an ally to Allah,
without the retail approach of answering each specific Hadith. So first and foremost, is the Hadith
authentic or not, we are extremely privileged, it's of the way that Allah preserve this religion and
preserve this port. And even that he preserved the explanation of the Quran, which was the tradition
of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, his statements, his actions,
		

			his tacit approvals what he was silent about, in approval of. And so we have something that is very
unique to our civilization, the science and the discipline of Hadith, by which we verify and
authenticate that this has been transmitted to us reliably, all the way from the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wasallam. So that traceability is important, is it authentic? Or is it not if it's not
authentic, and there are tons of ahaadeeth out there, and there are many of them that are
misogynistic, that people try to add weight to or add authority for, by claiming the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam made them and the Hadith science is enough, or Hadith scholars are
		

			enough for pointing out
		

			which and how and why they are
		

			untraceable, cannot be traced to the prophets also known. So is it authentic? Or is it not that step
one, if it is authentic, then step two comes, which is what does this hadith actually mean? Because
there are so many a hadith that are taken out of context.
		

			They're just plucked from the place from in which they were stated, which makes a big difference.
contextuality makes a huge difference, because it could specify the application to a particular
person, or a particular situation, or a particular characteristic, the knots the the * or the
gender of females, in this case that we're talking about here.
		

			And then also intertextuality intertextuality means what? To measure the texts against each other.
No one should ever take a hadith or an eye of the Quran, and read it in isolation. Rather, that's
the work of the scholars to collect everything on the subject first, and then with a community of
read, understand exactly what is the intended meaning here? Is it literal? Is it specific? Is it
figurative? Is it specific? Is it absolute, qualified, unqualified, abrogates it or not all of these
things? Those are the first two. And these actually are the easiest, because they require very
little work on your behalf. A lot. So Jen has erected in every generation, the the inheritors of the
		

			profits as the prophet SAW. Selim called them the scholars of Islam to help you filter through these
Heidi and it actually reminds me of a very good talk by Dr. Jonathan brown on the Athena Institute,
YouTube channel called howdy filters, which is extremely useful, far more useful in this short video
can ever be. And even more useful than that video by Dr. Brown or his works in print on the
ahaadeeth, or the Hadeeth, canon of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. And now that I think of
it, Dr. Jonathan Brown is always speaking very highly of our good brother. Mufti. matassa is a man
who's also a researcher at yaqeen Institute. He has a great paper that can be read up on regarding
		

			this subject called giving it a second look, basically the approach to apparently problematic Howdy.
So that's the second thing. First thing is authenticity. Second thing is the actual meaning. Those
are the easy part. The more difficult part because it requires you to do some
		

			digging deep in you
		

			Which is you critiquing your criticism or doubting your doubt? or asking yourself what exactly is my
problem with this howdy?
		

			There's so much to explain on this, but the idea is so many times, even for example, a non Muslims
criticize How do you hit the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam or fact in the Quran? They make a
very dogmatic generalization, which is that, whether they realize it or not, which is that what they
consider acceptable or unacceptable, is very different from that which is possible or impossible.
And so when you confuse impossibility
		

			with unacceptability, right, because we consider as human beings,
		

			so many things absolutely acceptable or absolutely unacceptable. And we consider it such a given,
when in reality, this is just dogma, you can't really defend this, these are just the impressions
that our time and our place had on us our society. Well, our society in 2020 disagrees with our
society
		

			in 1950, so can you imagine across time and space, how much more of how much more contention there
would be on what we consider acceptable and unacceptable.
		

			And so just that one concept, I'm sorry for the the movie details in the background, visiting some
family in the countryside.
		

			And my brain just fried.
		

			So you need to always ask yourself, Is this an absolute truth? Is this an absolute given? Or is this
just pure dogma?
		

			Because, you know, for example, part of our time and place the the social engineering that happens
whether realize it or not, is that people are very critical of Islam in particular, and two very
		

			clear aspects about Islam that they've
		

			always had contentions within our age, which is Islam has relationship with women. And it sounds
relationship with the other, right, the non Muslim.
		

			And so considering that is a very common theme, a very common criticism, we should be honest enough
to say, maybe that has rubbed off on me and skewed the way I'm reading these ahaadeeth. Maybe it has
made me hypersensitive, in the case of a How do you find women hypersensitive
		

			in how I read these ahaadeeth or read into these Ahadi things that aren't really there like
prejudice against women?
		

			That is extremely possible. And I like to give people some examples.
		

			When our sisters feel that a certain Hadith bothers them, because it seems to be leaning in the side
of the men and you feel like this is unfair. Did you ever feel that it was unfair? When the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and it definitely isn't unfair? I'm just talking about
		

			how you can hone in and get so locked in on a certain Hadith because of who you are, or because of
where you're coming from. And so did you ever feel that the Hadith that says your mother, your
mother, your mother, then your father, is a hadith that is prejudiced against men? It's definitely
not it is justified emphasis on the mother here. But it is not it doesn't appear at face value to be
just it's it's preferring one gender over the other. Did it ever feel problematic to you? When the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said to us that unlike women, we men are not allowed to
		

			wear gold and silk Did it ever though this one's a bit more complicated.
		

			Feel like a disadvantage to women. When the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam gave them the
concession
		

			gave them the concession to not pray while they're having their menstrual cycle. While men never
have this concession, right? And so sometimes people may say, how come that are difficult that had
these on women? How come there's so many more ahaadeeth that are critical of women? Has that really
been evaluated? Has there been like a numerical analysis?
		

			Have we been as critical of ahaadeeth? That seems to be disadvantaging men and reality it's not and
this is not the place to explain those things. And they don't disadvantage anyone. Our Deen is not
pro man or pro woman. It's pro both. It is pro justice, perfect equity to the end of that discussion
for a later time. I just want you to notice that we are product of our civil and so you need to
realize that your environment has for sure left some sort of stain on you some sort of stain on me
biases that we have and so we need to have the courage that's the third thing to the courage to say.
Why is this bothering me? Maybe the the problem
		

			problem is with the lens the frame of reference by which I'm evaluating these I had the the fourth
and last thing that I pray will be of help. And this also takes a lot of work is for us to ask
ourselves
		

			what is the first thing that comes to mind when we hear a hadith that does not jive gel with the
sensibilities of our age?
		

			Is it that we are critical of the Hadith, or critical of ourselves? And this is an extension of
point three, but I want to highlight it so that it's not lost. This advice that it was actually
given by Ali ibn Abu Talib
		

			radi Allahu taala on who he said to those who take from him reports regarding the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam Maha de, he said either had to command Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, when
I narrate something to you regarding the Messenger of Allah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam for Vaughn
Newby he levy who are there who now who then assume of it, make sure you're assuming of this
statement, that which is most rightly guided, most pleasant and most God fearing.
		

			And so ask yourself, this had the that is bothering me or I'm struggling to make sense of? Am I
interpreting it in the best possible light in the most correct light? Or does my head jump first?
What do I want to do? What am I inclined to do to assume the very best of the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam and what he meant by those statements to assume the very best of Allah azzawajal in
the fact that he guided His Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam to the best statements, and that he
preserved his religion by preserving the son of his messenger sallallahu alayhi wa sallam who Allah
that starting point, reinstating our perspective regarding the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam
		

			is really where it needs to begin, the more we nurture that the more we will receive the Hadith, the
way the Sahaba received, the May Allah be pleased with them, you know, these statements said by the
prophet sallallahu, alayhi wasallam were said to human beings were set to human beings, that were
also products of their environment. And certain things he said, Did not jive with their notions of
gender norms. But he flipped that did not, you know, just was easily palatable, whether it's the
dissemination of or the state distribution heritance whether it is the role of men and women and the
type of privileges and rights and responsibilities that men women should have. But when he came,
		

			they knew this was coming from a good place, the most compassionate heart sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam, and this was coming from an infallible place, if it was wrong, Allah would have corrected
it, he would not have left us in the dark. And so from there, you are able to understand best and
respond best to these a Hadith of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. So check authentication,
number one. Number two, try to understand through context and through intertextuality. What this
actually means. And then number three,
		

			ask yourself what are my biases? Am I saying this is impossible this can be simply because the
common sense the so called common sense, which is only common as a sensibility of our time here and
now says it's unacceptable when in reality it's not impossible. It is not wrong. It is not
insulting, it is not misogynistic. We just simply assume it to be unacceptable. And then number
four, what is our perception? When we first hear Howdy, where do we try to underwear is our anchor
bias. Yes, bias. Where do we start? Do we start that this hadith must be correct. If it's authentic,
I just need to understand the meaning. Or I just need to get past my misunderstanding of how things
		

			ought to be. Whereas the statements of Allah Zilla Jen and the statements of the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam they ought to be as they intended them because they are more worthy of being
correct than myself. And the reason I included in the end there and with it I close allies and the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam because
		

			critics many times go after the Hadith of the Prophet SAW Selim saying they're prejudiced towards
women or, you know, uncivil or barbaric or otherwise because they see this as relatively speaking
lower hanging fruit is easier to attack the sooner
		

			than to attack the Quran. For reasons that may be obvious. And so, they start with that, but we need
to realize that if we don't develop the proper filters, we don't develop the proper tools to see
through these criticisms to see through these whispers to see through these doubts, these very
contentions
		

			these misperceptions of the Hadith being harsh or inappropriate or unacceptable. They will bleed
into the Quran you will see in the Quran
		

			itself has very similar nuances or differences or assertions regarding men and women. And so if
you're going to allow yourself to let problems fester regarding the authentic hadith as correctly
understood of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, then you will eventually or very possibly have
a problem with the Quran itself. Because the message is one the sources one, even if the text itself
is variant, I'm going to stop there. I hope this was useful, and forgive me if it was not. And if it
wasn't goes to find the answer elsewhere. Don't let it fester. May Allah feed our faith in yours
with that which will solidify it and help us
		

			from allowing our hearts to be hijacked or confused regarding Him and His Messenger sallallahu
alayhi wasallam for as long as the journey of our life extends Latika Luffy calm everybody said I
want to equal Morocco to La Habra canto