It's a MAN'S world.... Or is it?!

[mood: tired]
[craving: sitting on the beach, drinking Chai Haleb with friends]

Forget what the West says about this being a "Man's world." Here in the middle east and with practicing Muslim's all over the world, it's clearly a "Woman's world". Fourteen hundred years ago, when the Message of Islam was brought to us, Allah (God) gave us Muslim women rights for so many things. When I talk to my friends, they can't believe some of the things they thought wasn't true about a woman's rights, is true. If any one knows me you will know that I would never be in a marriage/religion in which a woman would be treated badly. When I reverted to Islam, I was astonished by a lot of the rights women got. I always listened to the media and honestly, I stereo typed Islam. I thank God everyday that he lead me to this beautiful religion. Just like the quote I have, says

"I've learned from studying Islam and being Muslim,
that if your happiness is based on people approving
of everything you do, you're doomed to fail.
Islam helped me stand up and take responsibility
for everything to do with me."

Islam gave me rights!!!  

Let me name a few. 

1.  The right and duty to obtain education.
2. The right to have their own independent property.
3. The right to work to earn money if they need it or want it.
4. Equality of reward for equal deeds.
5. The right to express their opinion and be heard.
6. The right to provisions from the husband for all her needs and more.
7. The right to negotiate marriage terms of her choice.
8. The right to obtain divorce from her husband, even on the grounds that she simply can't stand him. (pls note that God deeply frowns upon divorce as a solution unless there is hardly any other alternative but it does not mean that men have more right to divorce their wives than women do.)
9. The right to keep all her own money (she is not responsible to support the family financially).
10. The right to accept or reject any suitor who proposes to her for marriage And more...
    
    Need I say more? LOL I just love how Islam gives us so many rights. We had more rights before rights to women were given in the West. Women started receiving their rights in Islam 1400 years ago when the message of Islam was brought forth. 
    
    Now, read this... 
    
    
    Women are given exemption from some duties, such as:
    
    - Fasting when they are pregnant or nursing or menstruating,
    - Praying when menstruating or bleeding after childbirth
    - The obligation to attend congregational prayers in the mosque on Fridays.
    - They are not obliged to take part as soldiers in the defense of Islam, although they are not forbidden to do so.
    But under normal circumstances they are allowed to do all the things that men do.
    - Even when they are menstruating, on special days, like the two eid festivals, they are still allowed to come to the eid prayers, and menstruating women can take part in most of the actions of the Hajj pilgrimage.  

Islamic law makes no demand that women should confine themselves to household duties. In fact the early Muslim women were found in all walks of life.    

The first wife of the Prophet, mother of all his surviving children, was a businesswoman who hired him as an employee, and proposed marriage to him through a third party; women traded in the marketplace, and the Khalifah Umar, not normally noted for his liberal attitude to women, appointed a woman, Shaff'a Bint Abdullah, to supervise the market. 

The Muslim woman has always had the right to own and manage her own property,

a right that women in the states has only attained in the last 100 years. Marriage in Islam does not mean that the man takes over the woman's property, nor does she automatically have the right to all his property if he dies intestate. Both are still regarded as individual people with responsibilities to other members of their family - parents, brothers, sisters etc. and inheritance rights illustrate this.

The husband has the duty to support and support the wife's financial needs, as stated in the Qur'an, and this is held to be so even if she is rich in her own right

He has no right to expect her to support herself, let alone support his children or him. If she does contribute to the household income this is regarded as a charitable deed on her part.

Women are thus well provided for: their husbands support them, and they inherit from all their relations. They are allowed to engage in business or work at home or outside the house, so long as the family does not suffer, and the money they make is their own, with no calls on it from other people until their death.
       
Husbands are expected to treat their wives kindly during marriage and even during and after divorce. 

... Live with them on a footing of kindness and equity. If ye take a dislike to them, it may be that ye dislike a thing, and Allah brings about through it a great deal of good.

Qur'an 4:19

The Prophet Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him) said:

The most perfect believers are the best in conduct and the best of you are those who are best to their wives.

(Hadith: Ibn Hanbal)

Ordinary Muslim women too are urged to lower their gaze and wrap themselves closely in their outer garments, letting their head-coverings fall over their neck opening, so that they may be recognized as respectable women and not bothered. The Prophet's wives are also reported to have covered their faces with their cloaks when they were among strange men. 

Those who regard veiling as a form of exploitation should ask themselves which is more exploitative of women, the mini skirt or the veil?

So, to conclude, these are the ideals to which Muslim women can aspire and frequently have done in the past. In a true Islamic society, they are guaranteed

- personal respect,

- respectable married status,

- legitimacy and maintenance for their children,

- the right to negotiate marriage terms of their choice,

- to refuse any marriage that does not please them,

- custody of their children after divorce,

- independent property of their own,

- the right and duty to obtain education,

- the right to work if they need or want it,

- equality of reward for equal deeds,

- the right to participate fully in public life and have their voices heard by those in power,

and much more besides.

[Final whisper: Om Abdulah - I missed our one million calls a day and can't wait to see you]