Womanhood in Islam (3/3)

Modern Research

In  recent  times,  it  has  been  accepted as  fact,  on  a  purely academic level, that  fundamental,  inborn  differences do exist between men  and women. A detailed article on the status of women in the Encyclopedia Britannica includes a section on "Scientific Studies of Male-Female Differences." Here the author points out physical differences in the respective constitutions of the male and female of the human species.

"With respect to personality traits," he writes, "men are characterized by greater aggressiveness, dominance and achievement motivation, women by greater dependency, a stronger social orientation, and the tendency to be more easily discouraged by failure than men."[1]

And there are a number of latter-day scientific experiments to back this up.  Researchers have found greater dependence and docility in very young girls, greater autonomy and activity in boys. One such experiment was conducted in the U.S. When a barrier was set up to separate youngsters from their mothers, boys tried to knock it down; girls cried helplessly.

There are personality differences between the sexes too. Some distinctions turn up remarkably early. At New York University, for example, researchers have found that a female infant stops sucking a bottle and looks up when someone comes into the room; a male pays no attention to the visitor.

Scientific researchers almost unanimously agree that hormones help determine how people feel and act, Thus the male-female differences are entirely genetic in nature.  The passivity found in women is due to the particular nature of the female hormones. Differences between male and female hormones exist from birth: they are not acquired later, as would be the case if they stemmed from differences in environment.

The tenets of Islam are based wholly on nature. This is because Islam is the religion of nature. The laws Islam requires us to follow are, in fact, our own instinctive human requirements expressed in legal terms. And the teachings of Islam with respect to women are no exception. They too are based on nature.  Modem, psychological, biological and anatomical research proves women to be more passive than men. This is the way their Maker has fashioned them.  The nature of their womanhood, the special part they have to play in society, demand that they should be just as they have been made -  that  is,  relatively delicate as compared  to  men.

It is this fact of nature on which Islamic teachings have been based. Because of women’s delicate constitution, Islam teaches men to be gentle with them. That way they will not lose heart or become too despondent to perform their special duties in life. Women are not like iron and steel ribs: they are fragile and delicate. It is best to let them be, in their natural state. If one treats them as though they were tough metal, one will only break them.

Remark of The Chief Justice

Giving his verdict in the Muhammad Ahmad-Shah Bano case, Mr. Y.V. Chandra Chud, Chief Justice of the Indian Supreme Court,  has  written  a  special note  in  which  he  says:

Some questions which arise under the ordinary civil and criminal law are of a far-reaching Significance to large segments of society which have been   traditionally subjected to unjust treatment. Women are one such segment. “Na stree swatantramarhati" (The woman does not deserve independence), said Manu, the law giver. And, it is alleged that the "fatal point in Islam is the degradation of woman.” To  the  Prophet  is ascribed the  statement,  hopefully wrongly, that  "woman was made from a crooked  rib, and  if you try  to   bend  it  straight, it  will  break;  therefore  treat  your  wives kindly."[2]

I  would  like to  make it  clear that  the  phrase  in  this passage, "hopefully wrongly," does not  mean that this  saying has been wrongly attributed to the  Prophet.  It  means  rather that  although  the  Prophet  said  that  woman  is  born  of  a "crooked rib," those who want to establish equality between man  and  woman  should  take  heart,  as  this  saying of the Prophet was contrary to  the  fact, This  phrase  of the  Chief Justice is  meant  to  deny  the  statement  itself and  not  the attribution.

Only a man of law can give a final opinion as to the relevance of this remark of the Chief Justice from the purely legal point of view, but it is certainly not correct from the academic point of view. He  has  quoted  this  saying of the Prophet to  support  his claim that Islam advocates the unjust treatment of a segment of society, whereas, on  the  contrary, this  saying enjoins  men  to  treat  women  with  justice. The remark of the honorable Chief Justice does apply to Manu's statement, but it does not apply at all to the sayings of the Prophet.

When it has been clearly stated that women should be treated gently, how can it be claimed that unjust and unfair treatment of women was advocated in a saying of the Prophet (as it clearly was in Manu’s dictum)?

So far as a woman's being like a rib is concerned, mention of this is made only to support fair treatment of women rather than the reverse. It has been clarified above that this was only an example. In view of the  particular psychology of women, "it was  cited  to  show  that  if  she  was  subjected  to  rough treatment, it would go against her nature and would result in perversion rather than  reform.

In this saying of the Prophet the likening of woman to the rib was a simple metaphor. The misunderstanding arose because of the biblical statement brought in to explain it. While this saying had nothing to do with the biblical conception of woman, what has been said in the above hadith is a natural fact which has often been expressed in different ways, as in the words of Matthew Arnold: "With women the heart argues, not the mind."

God "created man's mate from the same soul" means simply that women are of the same species as men. God created them that way so that there should be harmony between the two sexes. If men  and  women  had  been  derived  from  different species - if one had  been made from fire, for instance, and the other from earth -  then the two would have been unable to  get on  together. Family life would have lacked peace and harmony: men and women would have been unable to struggle hand in hand to build a better world.

As  for the  saying of the  Prophet  likening  women  to  a rib, it is a parable illustrating the need to treat women gently on  the  basis  of  their  particular,  natural  constitution.   The Prophet Muhammad delivered this advice time and time again, in different words, and it is something that he himself practiced throughout his life.

In  the  time of the  Prophet, women  used  to  attend  the night  prayer, and  sometimes  they  used  to  take  their  small children  along with  them.  The Prophet used to pay special attention to strict and full observance of prayer. Yet so great was his consideration for women that sometimes, when he heard babies crying, he would cut short the prayer. He once said: "Sometimes I stand up for prayer, my intention being to make it a long one. Then I hear a baby crying. So I cut short prayer, not wanting to make things difficult for the child's mother."[3]