Are Women Better Off Staying Home?

So now that Rahmani Raheem, was Allah Allahu ala Sayidina Muhammad while earlier he was starting to sell image nine, I was asked to speak about the topic, better hidden question mark.

This topic a little blurb says, Should woman just be homemakers and stay out of the affairs of men and the domain of men such as public life, formal education, specialized training, employment, financial independence, civic engagement and so on.

You probably have an understanding why they want me to talk to

them. Alright, let's let's get right to it then. Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim. We're will start the conversation is where the assumption comes from the very first thing I'm going to tell you, my dear sisters, is that always question assumptions?

Where does the assumption that so many of we hear this, we hear this not just by the way, it's not just for men? I hear this very often from women, too.

That a woman should stay at home?

It's an assumption. Where does the assumption come from? That's the question. You see when you say

a woman's place his her home, it can mean a lot of different things. And this is what we're going to break down together. I have heard in scholarly circles, both men and women. Try to use the verse in the Quran that talks about

does anyone know the verse?

Thank you, well cutter Nephi BeautyCon.

Now,

those of you who have been attending the Friday night Holika has we're going over the texts called Mahad. And when the sun the prohibitions of the tongue.

And just a few weeks ago, we talked about the prohibition of taking out of context, verses of the Quran, or Hadith.

You see, the Quran was revealed in which it has multiple and heavy meanings. And even if you are a native Arabic speaker, you can't just open the Quran or even the body of Hadith and say, Oh, I think it means this.

Even if that's what seems like on the surface, or seems like a literal explanation of the verse, you see, this idea is Isaiah 33 and chapter 33. And as up

and it starts out, we'll call it enough EBU Deacon. But it is right in the middle of a series of verses that come before us the context is everything. You have to understand suburban Newzoo. Why did this area Why was this area revealed? What was the sub of its Revelation, the reason for its revelation, there's a series of verses.

And it starts out

addressing the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and his wives.

It's a series of verses that talk about at the way into the point of it is Allah subhanaw taala, saying to the wives of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wa sallam that you wives are the Mothers of the Believers, you have a special place in Islam.

You thereby you have special rules that belong only to you.

Furthermore,

you have a choice, if you wish, the dunya and embellishments of the dunya the Prophet can for you, and you don't have to be his wife. But if you choose to be a wife of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, you have special rules that apply to you.

If you want Allah and His Messenger, these are the rules. And this will cutter Nephi BeautyCon is embedded right in the middle of these verses.

Because if you look even at verse 32, the first rank before it and the verses prior to that two, they started out with yeah Nissa unabIe

Oh wives of the Prophet. It's talking to specific people.

And thereby, the rules are for specific set of people lives of the prophets of Allah Juana he was sending

me It says let's do Nick, I hadn't milanesa you are not like any other woman.

Now, sisters, when people take something from the past, and try to extrapolate it and apply it to everybody, you can see where the problem is.

Let me tell you in case anyone's still fiddling with a little like, Well hold on, Isn't it supposed to be that that we understand? These are the wives of the Prophet? What about and the Mothers of the Believers who have very special rules? Even after the death of the prophets, Allah lives on them, there's certain things I can't do the cat marry anyone else. They are they are, they're almost like an intensive training with the prophets of Allah to set them to be the educators and teachers because they are the ones who are living directly with him. And they become the teachers of our ummah. Right. So somebody might say, Well, wait a second, we thought that this was something that

people often say, and women's places or home a woman's place, where is it coming from?

Now, we have different ethnicities here. So let me try something out. I've heard with my own years,

people who are at I don't want to any, please don't be offended by this. But these are true statements that I've heard.

I've heard some Moroccan people say, and very similar statement, by the way, by many of our Pakistani community, who will say something to the effect of the woman only should leave her home twice. Have you heard this?

She leaves her home, probably other ethnicities, too. I'm sure. She leaves her home, her father's home to her husband's home.

And from her husband's home to the house.

So you know this statement?

And you know, it's so well that you immediately quoted it. Or up I can't I can't do the Persians, Panama, but our Afghan sisters will say, and you have to help me with the wording here that a woman should either be home good, yeah. Or or what are in the grave.

So you know, the statement,

nonsense.

Okay.

When I was younger, I think I would have been a lot more careful and PC and careful in my wording. And think after all the years of therapy that I have done and counseling of families and people, this is cultural nonsense.

And it has caused so much pain, and so much difficulty for so many people unnecessarily.

And I'm not blaming just the men, because we women do this to ourselves to.

And we do it to each other as women.

And it is incredibly important to understand context, because context is everything. And I want to keep this conversation very balanced.

And so Samsung, who was actually here, last conference, if you remember her Marshmallow, one of my very dear teachers had this beautiful model. And I want to start with this. And I'll probably wrap up with it again, at the end. She calls it the circles of concern. Your circles of priorities,

your circles of influence, think of it as a circle, within a circle within a circle within a circle, concentric circles.

And at the core, if you really want to know your priorities, the core is what is your relationship with a loss upon what's on and nothing tops that nobody.

Now here's where people get confused.

You see, there's a pre marriage set of circles and there's a post marriage set of circles because pre marriage, the circle right after your relationship with Allah subhanaw taala is your relationship with your parents and your siblings, then comes your extended family then comes your community then comes your the OMA then comes all of humanity.

Post marriage, there is another circle.

For those who are Allah has written for them to get married, which is not everyone. There's another circle that comes in and it kind of elbows out the circles a little bit.

And people get really confused at this one. Because right after the relationship with Allah subhanaw taala right at the core, once married, the next circle out is actually the spouse and the children. People What about my parents? Well, listen, this is why Allah subhanaw taala put it this way in his eyes, gender gelato, and how He judges us. He puts and says who is the only person who can be responsible for this circle?

Earlier this week, I was doing a training for Imams.

And I said this exact same thing to them.

I say this model by the way to everybody Imams non Muslims. Here are your priorities. Right? Right. Because it's a human thing. Not just a woman's thing, not just the Muslim thing.

And I said to the Imams that next circle out after Allah subhanaw taala is your wife and no one else can be of her wife but you

know the all

opposite could be ostensibly different, not our conversation for today, per se. And my guess is not many of you would want to be in that case. But your spouse is your spouse, and no one else can be yourself, the spouse of that person's spouse but you, which is why they're in the next circle.

Your kids if you're blessed with them, biological children, you can only be the biological parent, mother or father of that child and no one else can be.

Other people compare it to help but no one else can be the biological parent, which is why that's there.

And for siblings, if you have them, the parents were split, the responsibility of parents can be shared.

Do you see what I'm saying? Okay, this is true. Men and women,

men and women, which is why when we look at the if we're looking at well thought enough EBU decoding the concept of what isn't it better to be at home. Islam says it is encouraged for both men and woman. There is no difference.

The priority of your spouse and your children and your home is equal to men and woman.

No one else can be the husband, other than him. No one else can be the father other than him. No one else can be the wife other than you and no one else could be the mother other than you. Do you see what I'm saying?

Which is why the companions of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam understood this so well. So you look at someone like epithet that one of the famous companions of the prophet, and he has his beautiful saying that he says Nim nirvana. So moto Lucha Libre it beta.

The best monastery for a man is his home

it's for men and for women because the priority as we showed in the circles is

for men and woman.

So this concept of be in your home and you should woman should always be in their home. Let's look at the manifest ceiling. Let's look at the scholars of Hadith. Now this is beautiful. Earlier we heard on Sunday had recite, masha Allah, and she recited in the house recitation. As you know, there are 10 different recitations of Quran. And there is a beauty in the fact that there is some differences and nuance. Most of them overlap by the way, but there are some words and some differences between them. This verse is one of them.

In the Huff's recitation we read while otter nephew BeautyCon, which translates into again talking to the wives of the prophets of lice, and settle or stay in your homes.

But that's not how it's always recited because in the scholars of the rest of the narrator's of Kufa and Basra

they recited as well clear enough you BeautyCon

with the casita with Khurana,

which changes the meaning not totally, but there is a different meaning. And there it means and remain dignified,

and remain dignified and serene in your homes.

So there are scholars even in the recitations of the Quran and the tifosi. That said, even for the prophets wives, there is a difference of meaning, let alone the rest of us. And so then the scholars have to see to come and say you have the very famous tell buddy, and I'm somebody who says that because of this difference of meaning and even in the original. I mean to say in the hops recitation of the word, whether it's cluttered up or cluttering up, they have both said that this means that it is an encouragement, but not an obligation.

Like why is it been ballade said that this is not an obligation, but an encouragement? You have another integer? These are all my fustian all scholars have to see an exegesis of the Quran. And he says the same thing, it's not compulsory.

So where are you get people on the member? In the hunt? Buzz because I've heard it in a hookah and stay in your homes. Right?

Stay hidden, it is better. It's better for men and women.

What is this thing this this fascination about it's better for women? Because if everybody knew their priorities, everybody would be spending more time at home.

Right? And then we don't have these very odd questions about like, should a woman get married or educated? What Why is this an either or question?

Why is it an either or question?

Because that's not the tradition of the sun. That's cultural nonsense. Mashallah. That's not the tradition of our noble predecessors, not of the woman, not the prophets, wives or Mothers of the Believers, and certainly not of the Sahaba yet. He wants to

Words of the Sahaba here. Let's do this. Let's talk about some of the Salafi let's quickly Masha Allah because you see what happens when we rely on knowledge of our deen see what happens if a woman stays at home I love this one of the scholars said if the woman really does is forced to be home then she's not able to engage in society learn and trade and finance and and figure out knowledge and go and seek income and travel all the benefits of that are taken away so you know what happens instead literally taken in the book it says she becomes petty

if you're not living a purposeful life, something with purpose and meaning to it.

The life is just the chore, the chores of life and it becomes petty

the conversations become petty

the conversations about what she wore and who got what person what shoes and what car and when he was kid went to what school and it starts to become very petty or even worse Yeah, I think that person on that show should have married that person and that person could you imagine this then happened and that happened and this happened and and know that bachelor should have married this relative garbage. I walked in the Congress the until conversation like this the other day and I was like,

the

petty, petty, not purposeful. And yes, maybe you call call me harsh, fine, but it's petty. It's pettiness. What are you spending your time actually doing? I didn't ask you to be a scholar of Islam. But when the focus men and women are leading a purposeful life, there's no time for this nonsense. Mashallah, right? Look at the look if you want to let's let's do the we kind of question now that we can have questions about assumption of that idea about whether women should be home and hidden. Okay, now let's look at proof proof from the sahaba. Yet, let's look directly at the time of the prophets, Allah Subhan. Allah Juana he was sent him because sometimes when we talk about modern

cases, they're like, but what about what about the prophets time? Okay, let's talk about the prophets. Let's talk about one of my favorite I don't have a lot of favorite stories, but I love the story of Conan

holed up in Canada. Do you remember the story of coda?

I love the story.

So growing up in Panama is a very important companion Sahaba of the prophets, Allah La Juana he was send them but the story I'm going to tell you here takes place as she's an older woman. And it's at the time of the Khalifa of Satan their alma

okay. And she walks up to Satan, no matter who is walking through the with his with his companions, you know, the Khalifa or the kala for the Muslims. And she stops him. He's on his way for another meeting. And she stops him. And so he sees her and he goes to her and talks to her.

And she tells him it's beautiful. She says, Oh Rama, can you imagine like an unseen like an elderly auntie, and she tells us now this is the Khalif

out of all people, okay? And she says, I remember you when you were a just a homemade

just little

fella in the marketplace of our pas and I remember when you were just hurting your sheep with a stick. You know, aunties do this, like totally embarrassing, right?

Okay, but here's your some important person and they're totally embarrassing you. Mashallah. And so, and then she says to him something very heavy. She says, Fear Allah,

in your wallets, Califa in taking care of people, and know that if you fear the threat of punishment in the hell in the Hereafter,

you'll realize that the hereafter is not that far away.

And if you fear death, then no, you're going to miss opportunities in this life. And you focus on the present. And be careful with that responsibility of the people that you're in charge of. So she's giving him this advice, but this is the Khalifa. So his companion says to him, you left and you got late for the meeting with a man to talk to this old woman.

That's what he said. That's literally what he said. So much says to him, whoa, he literally goes, Woe to you. Do you know who this is? This is this is holed up into that.

This is the woman who if she were to speak to me all day long, I would stand there. Unless it was a prayer time I'd go and I'd come back and keep listening to her. Because who am I not to listen to her when a law listen to her from the seven heavens.

And because of her complaint to Allah, Allah revealed verses in the Quran

what am I referring to

sunnah apt and Majed.

But semi, Allah has heard

the one who complains to you

Got her husband.

In.

This went earlier in life, she had went to the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam because her husband had tried to divorce her and mistreat her. And she complained to the prophets of Allah Juana, he will send them in long, long story short, is that the time a lot of the Prophet can't speak of his own desire he has to use right revelation. He said, I don't have an answer yet and Allah sent the revelation to answer her question. So here's Ahmed saying, Who am I taught to listen to her? When Allah has listened to her from the seven heavens and revealed verses?

They had no problem walking up to the key lifts. They had no problem going to the profits of a loved one to sell them asking questions. Look, another example quickly, a Madonna

who overheard one time the Khalifa Abdul Malik Evan Marwan All right. And in the nighttime, he was looking for his servant, his helper, and so he calls out to him in the servant and an answer. Maybe he was sleeping. So he curses him and she hears this. In the morning, she says to him, okay LIFFE,

I heard you purse your servant. So they, they didn't just they don't just question and ask and go up to even check them.

Right? If women weren't out and about and part of the system and part of the society and part of the education and part of the learning, how do you get stories like this? So here is a Madonna that sang to the Khalifa and Monique sang to him. Have you not heard of the Prophet sallallahu sedums Hadith where he says those who curse others shall not be accepted as intercessors or witnesses on the day of judgment are left almost.

This is wrong. Now for my activist sisters out there. This is what you call truth to power.

Do you understand what I'm saying?

This is really important that we start to understand who our noble predecessors were. So when people start to say no, no sister,

no, no young person, get married, stay at home. Their issue isn't about marriage or about staying home because we all need to stay at home.

The issue is about integrating an understanding and educating yourself about the team that if you have questions the woman Sahaba would hear something and if they weren't sure if they'd go up to the prophesy centum themselves, they asked the Prophet sallallahu Sallam for their own day

of learning just with him. But they would also be they would also be

at the general learning circles with the men and the woman and and at the prayers because we have several narrations where it says and I was praying in the first line of the woman right after the men like you know that they were in there.

Look, I'm going to share with you one more person because I just love her mashallah

to live up to many people in the in this in his seat on the stories, but her that I love her name is she felt she felt as though we you know, a little later we're going to talk as I close up we're going to talk about financial literacy and financial independence because this comes up as a question to you tell me how you how in counseling literally in counseling today, there are women who I'll ask them that there's tensions in the marriage and the issues and financial issues and I'll say, do you have access to your own account? It's a joint account.

Do you have access to the account? No. You don't know how much is in your joint account? No. You don't have a way for you know, everything is blocked off and like

there is a real problem and issue when women don't have financial literacy. This is something Allah has given you as Muslims on a silver platter for the first day of Islam. Why do we let our culture's take it away from us?

Oh, that's what they do back home. No, no, no, no garbage nonsense. It's not Islam.

How do you have she found out that were you? Speaking of saving in the Khalifa of St. Download? He appoints the First Minister of Finance and of itself. The very first minister of finance of Islam is a woman

and her name is she felt another way.

Or any chef that is actually a nickname. My name is Leila. Originally, Leila another way. And they named her they call they nicknamed her she felt. And she was given the role of all of the finances of the market. Now when I say the market, do you understand what this means? You have to be able to go into the market. You're dealing with men and women you're dealing with money and you're dealing with debts and bankruptcy you're dealing and then she had this role that if anybody didn't know the rules, get this the rules of trade and finance in Islamic phenomena, the flip of transactions in the section of the financial this is we would split the students we would call this chapter the headache

chapter.

So many complicated rules.

If that were lucky, I need Mashallah. And so here the the most fugly had the most knowledgeable of this topic of finances was a woman.

And he appoints her this role. And it essentially would go into market. And if she saw anybody who didn't know, man or woman who didn't know, the rules Well, or was trying to scam somebody, or was trying to, you know, cheat, or just didn't know the rules should kick them out of the market.

And under her leadership, the finances the treasury of the Muslims expanded greatly.

Now

is someone who can question the wisdom of Allah,

that he puts a woman in this role and puts a woman in the marketplace and knows who's best suited for the job.

Yet, we can't even get a woman on our mission boards, let alone be the treasurer of the boards.

Okay.

Now, somebody could say, Okay, you started the AI about paternity beauty Quinn, and the wives of the Prophet sallallahu. Sen says that they just mean that their home, I want to clarify this point in case anyone was confused by it.

We don't have time to go into all the different wives of the Prophet, but let's just say one, let's use one, maybe one that we don't speak of, frequently on cinema.

Okay, you have on Selena, for example, who we know not only was she present in a lot of everyday matters, but the lives were also present in the battles. They didn't just stay home. They were always part and parcel of the Muslim society. And so on Selma, one time there's a story about her where she's in her head, she's doing her hair, and they hear the call out for the Prophet calling out for people to come and listen. And so she says, so she says to her helper, she says, I'm gonna go and help her says, no, no, he's calling the men. He says, no, she said, No, the call said, all people, I'm a person

going out to see the prophets. And so she goes out, and she listens and the Prophet sallallahu Sallam that day was talking about the hold the pool, right? And, and, and later, what's interesting about the prophets wives on a in a salon, is that Ali, you know, there's one Allah here. And the hint is that they would, is that they would learn the same lesson that the Prophet said publicly later in their homes, like he would give them their personal lesson. Remember, he was training them to become our teachers. So she was going to hear this again later, but she wanted to be out there in the fabric of society. There are other narrations that talk about in the battles, you could see the

wives of the Prophet SAW Selim skirt back and forth, running back and forth, trying to give people water and help people and remedy people. And

even even she felt the reason she got her nickname, she felt the one about the finances, not not a wife, but one of the companions. So how Viet is because she was actually also on the battlefield helping medicate. So she got the nickname because she was very specialized in being able to treat sores.

Right polymaths Michelle. And so and think about on Selma to In another instance, when the Prophet sallallahu wasallam was trying to enter Mecca the first time and was stopped.

And he wanted to tell all his companions, we need to turn back and nobody wanted to listen. Who did he ask advice from?

Um, cinema, his wife, he said, I don't know what to do. And she said, Why don't you shave your hair first, indicating it's done? And then they will follow you and shave their hair, and everyone can leave. Now, how would he have asked her advice if she wasn't there? Do you understand what I'm trying to say? It is really important to understand the context and to question the assumptions about what does it mean, a woman should be home.

Now we talked about priorities, where I'm going to end my sister's insha Allah is really thinking about things like education.

I said before, why is it an either or between education in between our religion, between marriage between having children, there is a balance, here's the balance.

There should be not some false Islamic pretexts that people say, Oh, but Islam says it would be better for you to be a mother.

I saw my teachers balance beautifully, whatever Allah gave them, some woman, Allah gave the marriage, some didn't.

And from those who are married, some Allah gave them children, some didn't. But whatever Allah gives you, there's a perfect balance to the best of your ability. But you know, that means, you know what happens in our societies. We have extremes. We push people push, push, push to education. And so you have women who are told prioritize your education, prioritize your job, prioritize, climbing up that corporate ladder to the neglect of potentially getting married and forming a family if it's even written for her.

Then you have the

other extreme of No, no, no, forget higher education, you'll never get married and have children extremes.

Both are extremes. And then we have members of our society that want it all.

If you have family members and aunties of ours who want everything, they want you to be the Superwoman. But then when you really need them, where are they?

I mean, I don't usually disclose a lot, but I'll share this one piece of my own life, my family told me, we can see that you can do higher education, but you're gonna get married to.

And so while you're doing this, you're going to we're going to figure this out in parallel. And when you do that,

you need to show up. And they showed up, that's about a cola, people come up to me all the time and say, How did you do this? And I say, I didn't do anything.

There were a lot of people whose hands were in the pot, l hat allowing for this to happen. My eldest who's here with us, may Allah bless her and sha Allah will tell you that there were a lot of hands in raising the children Subhan Allah, but there were a lot of hands helping out. Because if you're going to push forward, somebody to join and be leadership and be in leadership and be in education, then into traditional societies, it said that there are at least four hands for every child that was born, four different pairs of hands that could help out in our nuclear family type societies that we have here, especially in the West, there's some research that says it is the nuclear family, that is

actually one of the reasons for the amount of child abuse and neglect them. Yeah.

There is something to be said about multiple hands helping out. And if you're going to push your kid towards education, you better be there. We need your help for kids to write, just saying my Shoba. And if they are not educated, then we deal with people believing weird cultural misconceptions, like what we have here. I talked already about financial independence, and how it's important that we have this and I'll just ask you this last conference, I spoke about Khadija radula, Juanjo

How do you have for the future having an entire business incredibly wealthy? Unless she had financial literacy?

How do you have a she thought that we were talking about today, being the Minister of finances, unless this was something already part of what the woman did of Islamic societies.

Lastly, civic engagement. And this is where I'll end Inshallah, serving your communities. If the circles of priorities I said, I'll end with this insha Allah. And so if you're back with it, if the circles of community mean that your core which is your relationship with Allah, subhanaw taala solid, and your family is in a good place, then of course, by all means, part of charity isn't just money that we give charity in a Salem is also our time.

It is our knowledge.

It is our effort.

That is charity. When you tutor somebody with the knowledge you have, that's a form of charity, it doesn't have to be dollars in a box.

When you volunteer have the time you say I don't know a lot, but I have time to help. Right? There's a pantry back here, Michelle, on this question. And other things have, you know, you give your time you give your time, that's a form of charity, even if you didn't pay anything out of the pocket because you didn't have much. All of these are forms of charity and forms of civic engagement. When you take the woman out of that, or you go to the other extreme of what we call the social justice warriors. Right, you end up with what you end up with people. And I'm going to use this example because I have people in my life who love dolphins, beautiful, majestic creatures, but they're all

about saving the dolphins.

And their house is a wreck.

Save the dolphins and for the younger people, your room is a mess.

This is a lack of understanding our priorities. It can't be one extreme, or the other. Mashallah. And lastly, our yardstick, my worry about civic engagement and people going into, you know, social justice

type work is people jump on a bandwagon of anything and everything that's happening today, even if it doesn't apply to us.

We have a yardstick that we measure things by let's call the Sunnah of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, if that cause out there, it fits with Islam, by all means, help, and if it doesn't, you have no business in that.

Shadow. We said this beautiful statement and some of you have been in my Holocaust have heard this before because I love it. And he says

that mankind has been in darkness. And Allah gave humans the ability to try to figure out light. So somebody figured out a candle and that was the amount of light they were able to bring

The next person figured out electricity and so they created a light bulb. So more lights and more sustainable light. The next person said, Let's put multiple Lily bulbs on a chandelier, more light. Now you have lights that are so powerful when you think of a stadium, Athletic Stadium at night playing a game at night, right? It is so bright in that stadium. Right? When you're in it, it feels like it's daytime. That's how bright it is.

So different people have been able to get different amounts of light depending on the gift Allah gave them.

But when the sun comes up in the morning,

you literally have to squint to see whether that stadia powerful stadium lights are even still on or not.

The sun

is like the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam in his sunnah. It outshines everything and anything that's manmade, and that humans came up with. And so we have a yardstick. It's called the Sunnah of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, if your civic engagement falls within it, and hamdulillah and if it doesn't, toss it out. And so I hope in sha Allah, as we talk about this and really talked about the different facets of a woman being hidden or outside or inside, we understand some poor things. We all need to do better in our homes we all need to do better in our priorities. And in sha Allah this is inspiring to really help us move forward Batticaloa hope you can forgive me for any

mistakes. May Allah subhanaw taala help us and preserve us and really make us from the type of woman who understand our priorities because it is with that, that Allah gives us the baraka and that Sophia the success to really be able to do well will close Allah Allah Who not so you then Um hum Medline early you know, Sofia, Sanam, thank you so much to them on a compliment.