A FATWA THAT STIRRED MUSLIMS 

Asghar Ali Engineer 

Recently the Darul Ulum, Deoband, issued a fatwa saying that if a woman works in any government or public office with other men, the income will be haram (prohibited) for her family. This fatwa was published prominently in Times of India, a leading newspaper. This stirred a hornets’ nest and a large number of Muslim women and men, including some ulama opposed the fatwa and Darul Ulum had to say it never issued such fatwa and that it had only responded to a question about women working in public offices.

There are two things involved here. One is that Muslims no longer unquestioningly accept whatever our Ulama say in such matters, particularly relating to women and their rights. Even some Ulama questioned the legitimacy of this fatwa. Secondly, and this is disturbing aspect, our Ulama are totally text-oriented, not problem-oriented. Whatever text was produced by our predecessors under very different conditions has become sacred for them and must be adhered to irrespective of drastic changes in the society.

Most of the Ulama who defended the fatwa argue that women can work in what they keep on calling shar’i hudud (limits of shari’ah). Firstly question arises why apply these shar’i hudud only to women? And secondly who will define these limits? For these ulama any mixing of men and women is an act of fitna (mischief). For them a woman’s character and integrity has no meaning or significance at all. If she raises veil from her face in a mixed gathering, she is transformed into a fitna.

There are several instances in the Holy Prophet’s life when men and women came together and Hazrat A’isha even led the battle of Jamal (Camel) and there were hundreds of sahaba (companions) were around and no one told her not to venture out of home to take part in the battle. Shifa bint-e-Abdullah, a leading lady, was appointed by Hazrat Umar as market inspector and no one protested. What was she doing as a market inspector? Dealing with women alone?

The Qur’an, which is the primary source of shari’ah, does not refer to hijab (veil) for ordinary women at all. On the other hand, it advises women not to display her zeenah (adornments) publicly (24:31) but refrains from defining what constitutes zeenah or adornment. It has been defined by various commentators depending on their cultural environment. Qur’an does not even say whether they should cover their heads, let alone faces. It says, on the other hand “except what appears thereof” leaving space for interpretation. There is near agreement among commentators that face and two hands should remain open.  However, it advises women to cover their breasts.

This above verse is preceded by advice to both men and women that let believing men that they lower their gaze and restrain their sexual passions (protect their sexual organs) and let believing women lower their gaze and protect their sexual organs. (24:30) In fact this is most important part of these two verses. The verse 30 is often ignored in which men is equally responsible for lowering his gaze and restraining his sexual passion.

Instead entire responsibility is put on women that they should cover themselves including their faces lest they should become source of fitna (mischief). Qur’an has put this responsibility on both men and women to restrain themselves. It is unfortunate that when it comes to women we totally ignore even what can be called maqasid al-shari’ah (i.e. intentions of shari’ah) and only woman is held responsible for her behavior.

Throughout the Qur’an men and women have been described as equally responsible for their deeds (a’mal) and will be given equal reward or punishment for whatever they do. If one needs any clarity on this let him carefully study the verse 33:35, besides several other verses in the Qur’an. If men and women are equally responsible for all their deeds both men and women will be equally responsible for their sexual conduct also and men would be equally source of fitna, not women alone as in our fiqh today.

In fact what our ulama call shar’i hudud were fixed by men who considered women as secondary to men and unequal in status due to cultural attitude towards women in the medieval era. The whole fiqh has to be thoroughly revised in keeping with the true spirit of Qur’an. Also, one needs to develop proper methodology and frame-work to understand Qur’anic intentions in totality, not in pieces, as our commentators have been doing.

Sticking to medievally understood shar’i hudud and culturally defined one, instead of religiously defined, will not serve the purpose any more.  

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Centre for Study of Society and Secularism

Mumbai

 
Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love; this is the eternal rule.