Why Hijab???

Why Hijab ??

1)     Modest Clothing

2)     Hijab and the West

3)     My body is my own business

4)     Let’s see what the science says about Hijab

5)     Some facts of America

 

Modest Clothing

Many non-Muslims feel sorry for any Muslim women they see adorned in their modest clothing. They feel that they are deprived the freedom to roam around in more scant and revealing clothing. Anyone who lives in a manner other that which they have become accustomed to is seen by them to be oppressed and forced to live in this manner. There are certain tribes in the Amazon jungle, in Australia, and in Africa which have become accustomed to walking around in a simple g-string around their waist. What would the people of the West say if these people were to condemn the Western habit of "forcing" their women to wear "excessive amounts  of clothing" and to demand that all women in the west immediately stop wearing anything but the simplest g-string around their waist? What if they were to say that the Western society should immediately stop unjustly persecuting their women and preventing them from freely roaming the streets wearing only a pair of socks? They would say that the people making these demands have no morals or shame. Philosophers would have a field day with such a question.

What if someone were to claim that it was immoral, discriminatory, and unjust to separate men and women in different public bathrooms, just as it is not just to do so with blacks and whites. What if this person were to then call (in the interest of equality, fairness, and constitutional freedom of course) for a merging of men and women's bathrooms into one "unisex" or "equal-opportunity" bathrooms for both men and women? Once again, the philosophers would have a field day. Anyone who follows the news will see that this may indeed be where the USA is now headed. In the New York Post (31 Aug. 1994 or a little before) it was reported that women have now won the right to appear topless in the New York subway system. Where will the USA be a few years from now? That is anyone's guess.

Who has the power to determine what decent and modest clothing is? Who is to determine what decent and modest behavior is? Muslims assign this right to God alone. This is the essence of "Islam." "Islam" means "The submission to the will of God." What God commands, a Muslim does. They do not demand that God justify his commands before they accept them. Once they have verified that a command is indeed from God then they abide by it without hesitation.

We can indeed find this lesson in the story of Adam. In the Islamic version of the story of Adam (slightly different than that of Judaism/Christianity), Adam and Eve were created by God, educated, clothed, and then allowed to inhabit heaven. They were told by God that they could have anything their hearts desired except they must not eat from the tree. Out of envy, the devil encouraged them to eat from the tree and told them that its fruit would make them angles or immortal. They ate from the tree and immediately, their bodies were revealed to one another, so they took to scooping up the leaves off the trees in order to cover themselves. This is when Allah sent them down to earth.  What mankind learned from this lesson is that just because a person does not know the wisdom behind a command of God, and others tell him to disobey it, then if they do not abide by it, by the time the reason for the command is made apparent to them it may be too late.

Example of dress worn by a Christian nun.
Compare it with how Muslim women dress today.

****************************************************************

Hijab and the West

From the dawn of civilization, flowing dresses and headscarves have always been associated with “Godliness” or “God consciousness”. Even the Christian pictorial representation of the earlier prophets and their womenfolk bear familiar likeness to the dress ordained for Muslim men and women. This tradition of modesty is reflected in the Quran, wherein Allah says:

“O Children of Adam! We have bestowed clothing upon you to cover yourselves (screen  your  private  parts, etc.)  and  as  an  adornment.  But  the  clothing  of  righteousness, that is better.” [7:26]

The word HIJAB comes from the Arabic word “hajaba” meaning to hide from view or to conceal the body and beauty from the gaze of the opposite sex. The women who uncover their beauty and show off their bodies and made-up faces for all to enjoy, expose themselves to be harmed by wolves in human clothing. Allah enjoined hijab on the Muslim women to protect them from harm. God knows His creation and knows that when women make a dazzling display of themselves with immodest clothes, perfumed bodies and made-up faces, it serves to increase the sexual deviance of the overall society. Many of those who are misguided,  say that the hijab is a portable prison that restricts our minds, lives and hearts. It is none of these things, and in order not to fall victim to such misguiding plots, we must begin to understand what the hijab truly is and what its significance is. Since the heyday of the feminist movement, while greater freedom  is enjoyed by the women world over today, the ramifications of such emancipation have not been without  untold  miseries and disasters. More than ever before, sex crimes are rampant and “liberated women” in the so-called civilized and modern societies face increasingly higher chances of being raped and sexually molested. According to a survey conducted by the Federal Government, it was found that in America, a rape is committed every six minutes. In sharp contrast, in Saudia, where Hijab is an unwritten dress code for the women, the crime of rape is practically non-existent. And the Western society calls itself a civilized society!

 [Source: Various articles in Arabic and English language Magazines including one by Sister Sumayyah Joan, a convert to Islam. Originally published in RESALAH, December,1999.]

****************************************************************

My Body is My Own Business

By Naheed Mustafa

MULTICULTURAL VOICES: A Canadian-born Muslim woman has taken to wearing the traditional hijab scarf.  It tends to make people see her as either a terrorist or a symbol of oppressed womanhood, but she finds the experience LIBERATING.
The Globe and Mail Tuesday, June 29, 1993 Facts and Arguments Page (A26).
HEADLINE:  MY BODY IS MY OWN BUSINESS By Naheed Mustafa.

I OFTEN wonder whether people see me as a radical, fundamentalist Muslim terrorist packing an AK-47 assault rifle inside my jean jacket. Or may be they see me as the poster girl for oppressed womanhood everywhere. I'm not sure which it is.  I get the whole gamut of strange looks, stares, and covert glances. You see, I wear the hijab, a scarf that covers my head, neck, and throat. I do this because I am a Muslim woman who believes her body is her own private concern.  Young Muslim women are reclaiming the hijab, reinterpreting it in light of its original purpose to give back to women ultimate control of their own bodies.

The Qur'an teaches us that men and women are equal, that individuals should not be judged according to gender, beauty, wealth, or privilege. The only thing that makes one person better than another is her or his character.  Nonetheless, people have a difficult time relating to me. After all, I'm young, Canadian born and raised, university educated why I would do this to myself, they ask.  Strangers speak to me in loud, slow English and often appear to be playing charades. They politely inquire how I like living in Canada and whether or not the cold bothers me. If I'm in the right mood, it can be very amusing.  But, why would I, a woman with all the advantages of a North American upbringing, suddenly, at 21, want to cover myself so that with the hijab and the other clothes I choose to wear, only my face and hands show?

Because it gives me freedom.

WOMEN are taught from early childhood that their worth is proportional to their attractiveness. We feel compelled to pursue abstract notions of beauty, half realizing that such a pursuit is futile.  When women reject this form of oppression, they face ridicule and contempt. Whether its women who refuse to wear makeup or to shave their legs, or to expose their bodies, society, both men and women, have trouble dealing with them.  In the Western world, the hijab has come to symbolize either forced silence or radical, unconscionable militancy. Actually, it's neither. It is simply a woman's assertion that judgment of her physical person is to play no role whatsoever in social interaction.

Wearing the hijab has given me freedom from constant attention to my physical self. Because my appearance is not subjected to public scrutiny, my beauty, or perhaps lack of it, has been removed from the realm of what can legitimately be discussed.
No one knows whether my hair looks as if I just stepped out of a salon, whether or not I can pinch an inch, or even if I have unsightly stretch marks. And because no one knows, no one cares.

Feeling that one has to meet the impossible male standards of beauty is tiring and often humiliating. I should know, I spent my entire teenage years trying to do it. It was a borderline bulimic and spent a lot of money I didn't have on potions and lotions in hopes of becoming the next Cindy Crawford.  The definition of beauty is ever-changing; waifish is good, waifish is bad, athletic is good -- sorry, athletic is bad. Narrow hips? Great. Narrow hips? Too bad.

Women are not going to achieve equality with the right to bear their breasts in public, as some people would like to have you believe. That would only make us party to our own objectification. True equality will be had only when women don't need to display themselves to get attention and won't need to defend their decision to keep their bodies to themselves.

Naheed Mustafa graduated from the University of Toronto last year with an honours degree in political and history.  She is currently studying journalism at Ryerson Polytechnic University.

****************************************************************

Let’s see what the science says about Hijab

(i)  Woman and the display of body

Describing women who are morally decayed, The prophet Mohammed (PBUH) said that they are “women dressed but naked, corrupt and corrupters, their hairs are like the inclined hump of female camel, they do not enter the Heaven nor smell its fragrance” [Refer to Abu Daud].

The prophet also said “the prayer of a mistreating woman is not acceptable until she purifies herself” [Refer to Imam Ahmed, Abu Daud & Ibn Maja]. The modern scientific researches confirmed that the nakedness of women, their body displaying & their moving in an obscene shape is a disaster on them. The current statistics showed that there is a clear spread of the malignant cancer which affects the naked and displayed part of the women bodies particularly those women who dress short clothes.

It was published in the British Medical Magazine that “the melanoma malignant cancer which was one of the rare cancers is now spreading among women. The cases of this type of cancer are increasing among young women. It affects their legs. The medical publication went on saying that the main cause behind the spread of short dress & fashions which expose the body of women to the rays & light of the sun. Moreover, the transparent dress and legs gloves do not help in avoiding this type of cancer. The Medical Magazine appealed to the environment doctors to participate in collecting information about this type of cancer, because it is becoming an epidemic phenomenon.

This reminds us with the Quranic sign which says in the tongue of the obstinate unbeliever “O God, if this is indeed The Truth from Thee, Rain down on us a shower of stones from the sky, or send us a grievous penalty” [8:32].

Now the torture has come down in the form of a malignant cancer. It is caused by the exposition of women’s body to the sunrays and ultraviolet rays for a long time it affects the whole body but with different proportion. Initially, it appears as a dark; small spot on either the foot or the leg, and some times in the eye. Then it spreads all over the body. It attacks the lymph knots at the upper part of the thigh. It also attacks blood and invades the liver & destroys it. It may settle in all the organs of the body such as bones, the belly & perhaps the kidneys. If it attacks the kidneys then the patient will experience black urine as a result of inner destruction of the kidneys. It may get transferred to the child in the womb of his mother. However, this disease does not allows its patient to survive for a long time & it does not respond to surgical treatment like other types of cancers nor it responds to treatment by rays sessions like some other types of cancers. Therefore have we realized the wisdom behind Islamic legislation which aimed to protect women not only from passers by but also from a skin disease called cancer. The subject Islamic legislation called upon women to corner their bodies properly & with loose and not narrow and not transparent clothes. Therefore, Islamic uniform for women protect them from physical diseases, from teasing in the streets & from the torture of life on the judgment day.

Source: “Scientific Miracles in Islam & Sunna Nabaweya” By: Mohammed Kamil Abdel Samad.

(ii)  Shaking hands with a woman

What happens when a man shakes hands with a woman? The science of Anatomy says that there are more than five million cells which cover the surface of human body. Their function is to transfer senses & feeling to the brain. When a man shakes hands with a woman their feelings get activated. Even the sense of smelling has a role in activating the feeling of sexual desire. The sense of hearing also is connected with the centers of human desires. If a woman hears words which reflect desire from man then what she has heard may move her desires.

In this regard Quran says “Say to the believing men that they should lower their gaze and guard their Modesty: that will make for greater Purity for them: And Allah is well acquainted with all that they do. And says to the believing woman that they should lower their gaze and guard their modesty, that they should not display their beauty and ornaments…” [24:30-31]

The above verses show that both men and women were addressed in equal terms to guard their various senses so that to reduce the probabilities of evils in the society. In other words, modern Anatomy is now discovering the roles of sense in instigating human desires whereas Quran is protecting the believers from such evils since fourteen centuries.

Source: The Age of Faith Dawned By: Shaikh Abdel Majeed ElZinadi

(iii)  Intermingling between the two sexes

The prophet Mohammad (S.A.W) said, “A man should not be alone with a strange woman unless there is a Mehram” [Refer to Bukhari and Muslim].

The term “Mehram” means the husband or the person who cannot marry the subject woman for example, her father, brother, uncle, sister son, brothers son or a brother from sucking. It is a well know fact that the unbridled in term intermingling between strange men and women instigates lower animal instincts in both sexes to such an extent that it can threat the existence and entity of the proper moral and good human society.

An American scholar called George Balsoshi mentioned in the book “The Sexual Revolution” that the Ex-president of America, George Kenedy has stated in 1962 that the future of America is in danger, because its youth are degenerated, liquid and sunk deep in reckless animal desires. They are irresponsible therefore they can not come up to the responsibility, which they have to bear. He said that among every seven young men who apply for recruitment in Army six are unfit, because their excessive moral degeneration made them both physically and psychologically unfit. A Lebanese Newspaper stated that coeducation in schools and universities makes girl students think only about their lower emotions and the ways of responding and quenching the animal instincts in them. The newspaper went on saying that more than sixty percent of the girl-students failed in exams and the basic reason behind their failure is that they think more about sex than about the academic tasks or even more than thinking about their future. This confirms what Dr. Alkas Karlil had said.  Dr. Karlil says that when sexual instinct arises in Man, a kind of hormone is secreted in the blood. This hormone moves to the brain and paralyses the ability to reason … Therefore, those who advocate intermingling of two sexes actually are not guided by the brain and proper reasoning but by their lower animal instincts. They do not take lesson from the moral degeneration that affects other nations who enhanced unbridled personal freedom and illegal relations between man and woman.

 A report of American Congress has shown that the crimes committed by the young adolescents are caused mainly by unbridled intermingling of the youth from the two sexes. All these and much more are clearly revealing the advantage of adhering to the sayings of the prophet of Islam Mohammad (S.A.W) the above mentioned saying of the prophet Mohammed (S.A.W) can be taken as a base of establishing and defining a proper, moral and really human social relation in general and between man and woman in particular.  Unbridled intermingling is one of the main reasons behind the disappearance of the sense of shy, which was a shield that protects the food woman from wolf-like men.  Unbridled intermingling between man and woman has given way to the spread of blind imitation under the name of the so-called civilization and progressiveness that confused the situation and made men like women and vice versa. It became evident that unbridled intermingling leads to abnormal behaviors and crimes.  What those who advocate unbridled intermingling between the two sexes would say about scandal of a British ministry of Industry, contemporary to Margret Tatcher, whose secretary has become illegally pregnant from him.  Strangely, the British Times Newspaper revealed that Margret Tatcher played an important role in convincing the Minister Barktson not to marry the victim because such a step would affect his reputation.  This indicates an implicit admitting of the evils of intermingling between the two sexes without “Mihram” but they are not able to accept the consequence of that unbridled intermingling in which man plays the role of a wolf and woman plays the role a deer, unfortunately woman is accepting this dehumanizing role and consequently she becomes its victim.  Many honest people all over the world are calling for reviewing the current state of affairs and re-organizing the relation between the two sexes within a framework that makes human society avoid its evils. This can be considered as a direct return to the guidance of the prophet of Islam Mohammad (S.A.W).

Source: “Scientific Miracles in Islam and Sunna Nabaweya” By” Mohammed Kamil Abdel Samed.

****************************************************************

Some facts of America

Ø                  Almost four out of five rapes are committed by attackers who knew or recognized their victims (National Information for Victims of Crime, 1998).

Ø                  77% of completed rapes are committed by non-strangers (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1997).

Ø                  Rape is the fastest growing violent crime in the United States (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1994).

Ø                  The rate of sexual assault in the U.S. is the highest of any industrialized nation in the world (Reiso & Roth, 1993).

Ø                  Approximately 683,000 adult American women are forcibly raped each year (National Center for Victims of Crime & Crime Victims Research and Treatment Center, 1992).

Ø                  6 out of 10 sexual assaults occurred in the survivor's home or at the home of a friend, relative, or neighbor (U.S. Department of Justice).

Ø                  In the U.S., a rape is reported every six minutes (Bureau of Justice, 1991).

Ø                  National crime studies indicate that 10-16% of adult sexual assaults are reported to law enforcement (Bureau of Justice, 1991).

****************************************************************