Hijab (Veil) of the Muslims of Today (2/2)

The Real Motives

One common weakness with man is that when he adopts an attitude in life, his approach in the beginning is generally emotional and irrational. Later, he tries to prove it to be rational by resort to argument and reason. The same was the approach adopted by the Muslims with regard to the Law of Purdah. It did not arise under the feeling of a rational or religious need, it arose as a result of being overwhelmed by the attractive culture of a dominant power and its vehement propaganda against Islamic culture.

When our so-called reformers saw with dazed eyes the European ladies in their full make-up moving freely and participating actively in social life, they could not help longing to see their own actively in social life, they could not help longing to see their own womenfolk also tread the same path of freedom and progress. They were also influenced by the modern concepts of the emancipation and education of women and the propaganda of the equality of the sexes that was incessantly being carried out by powerful logic and the printing machine. The literature thus produced was so attractive and powerful that it adversely affected their powers of thinking and discrimination. It forced them to believe in these concepts without question, and propagate them by all possible means. They were convinced that enforcing these concepts in the practical life was absolutely essential for one who liked to be called “enlightened and broadminded” as against “rigid and old-fashioned”. Therefore, when modestly dressed veiled women were dubbed “moving tents and shrouded funerals”, these so-called reformers felt shamed into disgrace. Obviously, they could not put up with this disgrace and humiliation for a long time. They were, therefore, impelled to wash off this shameful blot from the face of their social life as soon as possible.

Such were the feelings and trends that gave birth to the movement for the emancipation of women among the Muslims towards the end of 19th century. Some people who did not know why they felt inclined towards this movement had these very sentiments lurking in their subconscious. They were in fact laboring under self-deception. Others who were fully conscious of their inclinations could not dare express them openly. They did not deceive themselves, they tried to deceive others. Both the classes, however, made it a point to conceal the real motives behind their movement and tried to project it as a rational, instead of an emotional movement. The various pretexts that were brought in support of it were all imported directly from Europe. Among these were women’s health considerations, growth of their intellectual capabilities and practical skills, protection of their natural birth rights, safeguarding their economic independence, their deliverance from man’s bondage and apathy and, above all, the necessity of their progress as on it alone depended the cultural advancement of the whole community. These pretexts were put forth with a view to hoodwinking the common Muslims and keeping them in the dark about the real motives of the guiding and directing the womenfolk to follow in the footsteps of the Western women and moulding them into the social patterns prevalent in the West.

 A Great Hoax

The greatest hoax that has been played in this connection is that efforts were made to prove from the Qur’an and Hadith that this movement was in perfect conformity with Islam. The fact, however, is that Islam and Western civilization are poles apart in their objectives as well as in their principles of social organization. Islam, as we shall see later, aims at canalizing man’s sex energy by moral discipline so as to render it conducive to the building up of a clean and pious culture instead of wasting it in dissipation and erotic passions. In contrast to this, the Western civilization aims at speeding up material progress by encouraging equal participation of man and woman in the affairs and responsibilities of life, and at the same time sublimating sex energy in arts and other channels with a view to getting relief from the bitter hardships of the life-struggle. This difference of objectives necessarily leads to a fundamental difference in approach and methods of social organization as adopted by Islam and Western civilization. Thus the object of Islam is to establish a social order that segregates the spheres of activity of the male and female, discourages and controls the free intermingling of the sexes, and curbs all such factors as are likely to upset and jeopardize the social discipline. On the contrary the object before the Western civilization requires, and naturally so, that both the sexes should be drawn into the same field of life and activity, that all such hindrances and impediments should be removed as are likely to obstruct their free promiscuous intermingling, and that they should be afforded unlimited opportunities to enjoy each other’s beauty and charm of physical perfections.

Now, an intelligent person can see how sadly mistaken are those people who, on the one hand, feel inclined to follow the Western civilization and, on the other, cite Islamic principles or social life is support of their trends. According to the social system of Islam, a woman at the most can uncover her hands and her face if necessary, and can go out of her house for genuine needs. But these people take this last limit as their starting point. They set out from the point where Islam comes to halt and transgress all limits of decency and modesty without hesitation. Not to speak of the hands and face, beautifully parted hair on the head bare arms to the shoulders and semi-covered breasts are also displayed. Rest of the bodily charms also covered in gauzy attires as to satisfy the hungry sexual gaze of men. More than that, taste fully dressed wives, sisters and daughters in full make-up, are brought face to face with friends, not to speak of near relations and are encouraged to mix freely and have good time with them in a manner and to an extent unimaginable for a Muslim lady even in company of her real brother. Permission to leave the house that was conditional on the genuine need and observance of perfect modesty and full covering of the body is being abused for license to roam aimlessly on the road-side, stroll in the parks, visit hotels and go to picture, in glamorous saris and attractive blouses that hardly cover their nakedness. The limited and conditional freedom that women had been allowed by Islam in matters other than home science is being used as argument to encourage the Muslim women to abandon home life and its responsibilities like the European women and make their lives miserable by running after political, economic, social and other activities shoulder to shoulder with men. 

Things in the sub-continent have so far reached this state, but the condition of the people of Egypt, Turkey and Iran, who are politically free but mentally servile, is even worse. To vie with European women, the “Muslim” women of these countries have started wearing exactly the same sort of dress as is worn in the West. Turkish ladies have taken to beach bathing in the one-piece bathing suits, the dress which hardly covers one-fourth of the body and that also in a manner as to reveal all the outlines of the female figure. 

One wonders how people can seek justification for such a shameless way of life from the Qur’an and Hadith. If some people feel like adopting it, they should boldly do so and declare their desertion of Islam and its law unequivocally. This would indeed be the height of hypocrisy and dishonesty on their part if they openly adopted in the name of the Qur’an that system and way of life whose basic principles, objectives and practices have been condemned, one and all, as unlawful by the Qur’an. By citing the Qur’an at the outset they perhaps want to deceive the world into believing that they are following the Qur’an in their entire lives.

The Objective Before Us

Such being the condition of the “Muslims” of today, our object in this book is two-fold:

First, we propose to present before the people at large, Muslims or non-Muslims, the entire Social System of Islam and explain to them the necessity and importance of the Purdah injunctions in it.

Second, we want to present before the “modern” Muslims the injunction of the Qur’an and Hadith as against the doctrines and results of the Western way of life with a view to helping them to give up their hypocritical attitude towards life. This will enable them to choose one of the two alternatives with a clear heart: Either they will have to live in accordance with the Islamic injunctions if they want to remain Muslims, or they will have to discard Islam if they are prepared to face those disgraceful results towards which the Western way of life will inevitably lead them.