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What does the |
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Women Covering Themselves |
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Question: Does Islam require women to cover themselves? |
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Summary Answer: Yes. The reason is that it is supposed to curb the sexual appetites of
passing men when women travel outside the home. Women are also not allowed
to travel by themselves, or be alone with a man who is not a relative. |
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The Qur'an: Sura (24:31) - Commands women to "draw their headscarves" over their neckline as well. Sura (33:59) - "Tell thy wives and thy daughters and the women of the believers to draw their cloaks close round them..."
Sura (24:31)
- "And say to the believing women that they cast down their looks and guard
their private parts and do not display their ornaments except what appears
thereof, and let them wear their head-coverings over their bosoms, and not
display their ornaments except to their husbands or their fathers, or the
fathers of their husbands, or their sons, or the sons of their husbands, or
their brothers, or their brothers' sons, or their sisters' sons, or their women,
or those whom their right hands possess, or the male servants not having need
(of women), or the children who have not attained knowledge of what is hidden of
women; and let them not strike their feet so that what they hide of their
ornaments may be known." The woman is not only supposed to cover
herself, except with relatives, but to look down, so as to avoid making
eye-contact with men. |
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Bukhari (6:321) - Muhammad is asked whether it is right for a young woman to leave her house without a veil. He replies, "She should cover herself with the veil of her companion."
Bukhari (60:282) - After Muhammad issued the command (Sura 24:31) for women to cover themselves, the women responded by tearing up sheets to cover their faces.
Abu Dawud (2:641) - The Prophet (peace_be_upon_him) said: Allah does not accept the prayer of a woman who has reached puberty unless she wears a veil.
Bukhari (52:250) - [The Prophet said] "It is not permissible for a man to be alone with a woman, and no lady should travel except with a Muhram (i.e. her husband or a person whom she cannot marry in any case for ever; e.g. her father, brother, etc.)." - Neither is a woman allowed to travel by herself.
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Islamic law (Sharia) clearly requires women to cover themselves. The degree of covering varies with how seriously a Muslim government interprets this, with the Taliban's Afghanistan at one extreme (requiring full burqas) and moderate governments such as Turkey and Tunisia (actually banning headscarves in public buildings) at the other.
The head covering is interpreted as a symbol of male domination by most critics outside the faith, and by many Muslim women, who have been fighting for the right to dress as they please. In December of 2007, a father in Canada beat his 16-year-old daughter to death for refusing to wear the hijab (headscarf).
Some insist that the veil is not mandated by the religion, although they do not have anything within the sacred texts to counter the passages in which Muhammad instructed its use. In fact, verse 24:60 says that the veil is only optional for unmarried women who are too old to have children, and even then the freedom to uncover the head is discouraged.
There are also many Muslim women who have come to rely on the veil as a protection against unwanted male attention. Some even describe it as 'liberating.'
In the West, the veil is gradually becoming a chic
statement of political protest. Veils and burqas are becoming more common
in Muslim countries with the resurgence of Islamic fundamentalism. |
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