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"God does not judge according to your
bodies and appearances, but he scans your hearts and looks into your
deeds." - Hadith of Prophet Mohammed
"The true Islamic tradition enjoins the veiling of the hair and neck,
and modest conduct - that is all"
- Mohammad Marmaduke Pickthall
"Muslims who advance conservative views on female affairs...are
normally very literal in their understanding of texts; but they tendentiously
opt for an understanding that suits their prejudice." - Dr. Hassan
Al-Turabi
Please do not think that I am judging by
any foreign standard nor wishing to recommend foreign ways. I am judging only by
the Shari'ah and I wish to recommend only the way of the Shari'ah. - Mohammad Marmaduke Pickthall
"A Crime and a Libel on Islam"
- Syed Mumtaz Ali and Rabia Mills
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Yes to Hijab, No to
Niqaab.
The sinister and the
smiling faces of Islam
The face veil - not
originally Islamic and
the kiss of death for Da'wah in the West, argues concerned Muslim convert Michael Young, with reference to the works of Dr Hassan
Al-Turabi, Quran translator Mohammad Marmaduke Pickthall
and other Islamic scholars.
"First impressions always
last... An unappealing
image is a cause for aversion... Too often we find Muslims attired in a fashion that fosters
derision or suspicion." So states London-based, Syrian-born
Islamic scholar Shaykh Muhammad al-Abdah in his book, On
Contemporary Dawah (Calling to Islam) Which of these is making the
better impression on behalf of Islam?
Could there possibly be anything that engenders more derision
or suspicion about Islam in western eyes than the face veil worn by a small
minority of Muslim women? In my experience, whereas a growing number
of westerners are coming to accept and even respect the simple hijab
(headscarf/hair-covering) as a symbol of modesty and good character in Muslim
women, almost universally westerners find niqaab (the face veil) and the head to toe
black garb that usually accompanies it sinister, frightening and repulsive.
It makes them recoil from Islam.
As a western convert to Islam, I see
first hand only too well among my family, western colleagues and old circle of
friends the extreme harm face veiling does to the image of Islam and to the efforts
to spread Islam in the west. The tragedy is that this phenomenon is so
unrepresentative of Islam. The vast majority of Muslims do not
consider this form of attire compulsory. Most contend that face veiling was,
in fact, exclusively the preserve of the wives of Prophet Mohammed (pbuh) who,
we are told in the Quran 33:33, "are not like other women" in order to give them privacy and protection in Madinah where they lived at the main mosque, not in private compounds.
This is certainly the view of the noted Sudanese scholar, Dr Hassan al-Turabi,
who is so often characterized in the media as an Islamic fundamentalist. In his
tract On
the Position of Women in Islam and in Islamic Society Dr Turabi states:
"So far as the familiar Hijab is concerned, it refers to
the special regulation pertaining to the Prophet's wives due to their status and
situations. They occupied a position different from all other women, their
responsibility is thereby stiffened. God has ordained that their reward as well
as punishment be double that for any other woman. "O wives of the Prophet
whoever of you commits a vile deed will have her punishment doubled. And that,
for God, is quite easy. And whosoever of you serves God and his Prophet devoutly
and acts righteously, we shall give her double reward. And we have prepared for
her honourable sustenance in the hereafter". (Al-Ahzab, 30-31).
The verses of the same Sura ordained that the wives of the Prophet (peace
upon him) draw a curtain (to ensure privacy in the Prophet's room which
naturally attracted many visitors of all sorts), and that they dress up
completely without showing any part of their bodies including face and hands to
any man; though all other Muslim women were exempted from these restrictions."
Canadian writers Syed Mumtaz Ali and Rabia Mills concur.
In their essay Social Degradation of Women - A Crime and a Libel on Islam,
they explain:
"One must realize and appreciate the fact that the
commandment in the Qur'an in Chapter 33, verse 53, with respect to the Hijab,
applies only to the "Mothers of the Believers" (the wives of
the Holy Prophet, p.b.u.h.) whereas the wording of the Qur'an in Chapter
33 verse 55, applies to all Muslim women in general. No screen or Hijab (Purdah)
is mentioned in this verse -- it prescribes only a veil to cover the bosom and
modesty in dress. Hence the unlawfulness of the practice of the Indian-style
system of Purdah [full face veiling]. Under this system, the Hijab is not
only imposed upon all Muslim women, but it is also quite often forced upon them
in an obligatory and mandatory fashion. Even the literal reading/translation of
this Quranic verse does not support the assertion that the Hijab is recommended
for all Muslim women. The Hijab/screen was a special feature of honour for the
Prophet's p.b.u.h. wives and it was introduced only about five or six years
before his death."
[Note: These writers are using the term hijab
interchangeably with niqaab/purdah, i.e. face veiling. Hijab
is more usually understood to mean simply a covering encompassing the hair and
neck, but not the face itself.]
Dr Turabi is by no means the only scholar of
world repute arguing
against the face veil. The famed Quran translator, Mohammad Marmaduke
Pickthall, condemned it as non-Islamic in his 1925 lecture The Relation of the
Sexes. Commenting on what he described as the "pitiful condition
of Muslim womanhood in India" at that time, he began his remarks by stating
emphatically:
"Please do not think that I am judging by any foreign
standard nor wishing to recommend foreign ways. I am judging only by the
Shari'ah and I wish to recommend only the way of the Shari'ah."
Pickthall then deals with the issue of full face veiling
(known in Urdu and Hindi as Purdah) in depth, an extract of which
is reproduced here.
"There is no text in the Qur'an, no saying of our Prophet, which can possibly be held to justify the
practice of depriving women of the natural benefits which Allah has decreed for
all mankind (i.e. sunshine and fresh air and healthy movement)....The true
Islamic tradition enjoins the veiling of the hair and neck, and modest conduct -
that is all."
This is borne out
by the following hadith:
"Ayesha (R) reported that Asmaa the
daughter of Abu Bakr (R) came to the Messenger of Allah (S) while wearing thin
clothing. He approached her and said: 'O Asmaa! When a girl reaches the
menstrual age, it is not proper that anything should remain exposed except this
and this. He pointed to the face and hands." (Abu Dawood)
Pickthall continues:
"The veiling of the face by
women was not originally an Islamic custom. It was prevalent in many cities of
the East before the coming of Islam, but not in the cities of Arabia. The purdah
system, as it now exists in India, was quite undreamt of by the Muslims in the
early centuries, who had adopted the face-veil and some other fashions for their
women when they entered the cities of Syria, Mesopotamia, Persia and Egypt. It
was once a concession to the prevailing custom and was a protection to their
women from misunderstanding by peoples accustomed to associate unveiled faces
with loose character. Later on it was adopted even in the cities of Arabia as a
mark of [tamaddun] a word generally translated as 'civilization', but which in
Arabic still retains a stronger flavour of its root meaning 'townsmanship' that
is carried by the English word. It has never been a universal custom for Muslim
women, the great majority of whom have never used it, since the majority of the
Muslim women in the world are peasants who work with their husbands and brothers
in the fields. For them the face-veil would be an absurd encumbrance. The
head-veil, on the other hand, is universal.
Thus the Purdah system is
neither of Islamic nor Arabian origin. It is of Zoroastrian Persian, and
Christian Byzantine origin. It has nothing to do with the religion of Islam,
and, for practical reasons, it has never been adopted by the great majority of
Muslim women....The Purdah system is not a part of the Islamic law. It is a
custom of the court introduced after the Khilafat had degenerated from the true
Islamic standard and, under Persian and Byzantine influences, had become mere
Oriental despotism. It comes from the source of weakness to Islam not from the
source of strength."
Da'wah, or the propagation of Islam, is the duty of every
Muslim, female as well as male. My personal view is that face veiling overwhelmingly
reinforces every conceivable western prejudice about Muslims and Islam and
therefore constitutes a serious impediment to Da'wah in the west, probably the
single greatest visible impediment, in fact. I am quite sure that
women who veil are decent, sincere Muslimahs who genuinely believe that they
have legitimate, Islamicly mandated reasons for doing so, even though most other
Muslims and some leading scholars disagree with them. Though to quote Dr Turabi again:
"Muslims who advance conservative views on female affairs...are
normally very literal in their understanding of texts; but they tendentiously
opt for an understanding that suits their prejudice."
Be that as it may, I would respectfully ask Muslim women in the west, whether Muslim born or convert, who wear the
face veil instead of simple hijab to spend time in reflection and prayer about this issue.
I sincerely entreat
women who face veil to
think of the big picture and seriously consider the dreadful impression they create of Islam by the way they choose to
dress and how this can be the kiss of death for the widespread propagation of Islam
in the west.
Allahu a`lam. God knows best.
© Michael Young 2001
MichaelYoung101@yahoo.com
Read other articles on Islam by Michael
young here.
Notes
On Contemporary
Dawah
by Shaykh Muhammad al-Abdah
© Eden Books 1998
Published by Eden Books
PO Box 9125
London
England
W3 0ZR
Suggested further reading
Why
I Wear Hijab And Not Niqaab
Tara bint Curtis Gregory, a conservative,
Arabic-speaking American convert to Islam conducts a painstaking word-for-word
investigation of what the often disputed references from the Quran and ahadith
actually say and sets out the conclusions she has arrived at after three years
of research. Hijab:
An interpretation of Islamic women's dress
A Muslim woman
writer explores this issue with fulsome reference to the Quran and arrives at
very different conclusions to her veiled sisters.
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