The Thesis of Islam about Beating Women

Is it Allowed or Forbidden in Islam?

The source of the Islamic Laws are the Verses of the Holy Qur’an and the Sunnah of the Prophet (Peace be upon him), and based on these two we will conclude to the judgment of Islam on beating women, and in their light you, dear reader, decide in which category of acts one should place beating women. That is, the category of the obligatory, the preferable, the permissible, the repugnant or the forbidden?

Iyas bin Abd Allah said that the Messenger of Allah (Peace be upon him) said: “Do not beat women”, then (some other time, after the Prophet had forbidden beating women) ‘Umar ibn Al-Khattab came to the Prophet (Peace be upon him), saying to him: “Women came over their men, disobeying them and treating them with arrogance and bad manner.” Then the Prophet (Peace be upon him) gave them permission to beat them (making an exception for such cases). After that many women came to the Prophet’s wives complaining about their husbands. And then the Prophet (Peace be upon him) said: “Many women have come to Muhammad’s wives complaining about their husbands, those men are not the best among you.” (Reported by Abu Dawud, Ibn Majah, Ad-Darmi).

From the analysis of this Hadith we can conclude to the following:

This Hadith (saying of the Prophet (Peace be upon him)) includes three different sayings of the Prophet (Peace be upon him), which he said in three different occasions, and not only once, in one sole case:

The first occasion:

The Prophet (Peace be upon him) said “Do not beat women.”, and here ends the first occasion, and therefore, whoever had heard these words from the Messenger of Allah (Peace be upon him) had learnt with certainty that the Islamic view on beating women was that it is forbidden and that whoever does it is a sinner, since he has violated the Prophet’s (Peace be upon him) command.

According to these, I address my response to you, dear reader. If you were there during that time and heard the Messenger of Allah (Peace be upon him) say, “Do not beat women” would you say that beating women, according to the Islamic Law, is obligatory, preferable, permissible, repugnant or forbidden? And would you consider that whoever did it would be rewarded or considered a sinner? And would you say that Islam oppresses women and allows beating them?

The second occasion:

Now, let us move to the second part of the hadith, in which ‘Umar ibn Al-Khattab came to the Prophet (Peace be upon him), meaning that this happened on another occasion than when the Prophet (Peace be upon him) said: “Do not beat women.”  ‘Umar came to complain about the women, saying: “Women came over their men, disobeying them and treating them with arrogance and a bad manner.” Here and only here, as an exception, the Prophet (Peace be upon him), taking into consideration the realistic circumstances of life, gave permission to beat one’s wife, ONLY in such circumstances. But how should this beating be? This will be explained later on.

The third occasion:

Now, let us move to the third part of the hadith, (After that many women came to the wives of the Prophet (Peace be upon him) complaining about their husbands. And then the Prophet (Peace be upon him) said: “Many women have come to Muhammad’s wives complaining about their husbands, those men are not the best among you.”). Here lies the final judgment about beating women in Islam, that it is a repugnant or a forbidden deed, if the husband transgresses the limits set by Allah, which will be explained later on.

Do you understand from this hadith that the Messenger of Allah (Peace be upon him) commended whosoever beats his wife? Or did he encourage that one beats his wife? Or did he reprove whosoever beats his wife?!!! The Prophet’s Companions rushed to receive the pleasure of Allah’s Messenger (Peace be upon him). And that is why they knew with certainty that he who beats his wife is not the one who receive the Messenger’s pleasure, but the opposite. That is, he who does not beat his wife and forgives her mistakes is the one who will receive the pleasure of the Messenger (Peace be upon him). And without any doubt, any deed that the Prophet (Peace be upon him) hates goes to the category of the repugnant acts, or even the forbidden ones.