APRIL 20
A Witness
On a journey to the USA I learnt of an American lady who, after converting to Islam, got married to a Pakistani Muslim, one Naseer Ahmad Mirza. Her present name is Jeanine Aisha Mirza, and she lives in Utah. In the course of an interview she gave to an American journal, she made the following observation:
“While most Americans are under the impression that Muslim wives are oppressed. Mirza said, she has not found that to be true. “It’s just a different division. Outside the home, my husband’s the boss. But in my house, I’m the boss.”
A number of such incidents have come to my knowledge. Certain American women are wary of marrying whites, for fear of divorce taking place at any time. This is why serious women prefer marrying Muslims, preferably those who come to America for the purpose of education. In this way such marriages have become a means of propagating Islam. When the newspapers ask them about Islam, they defend their newly acquired faith in an excellent manner, as quoted above.
Islam does not degrade the status of woman as compared to that of men. Instead, on the principle of equality, the system of separate workplaces has been established. Islam has divided the affairs of life into two major parts, one outdoor and the other indoor. According to Islam, man is in charge of the outdoor departments of life while woman attends to indoor matters. So that Jeanine Aisha Mirza very aptly represented this principle of Islam in the light of her own experience.
This division is very appropriate for both. In this way the man is free to devote his maximum energy to one department while the woman is free to give her full attention to indoor affairs. This makes for greater efficiency in both spheres.
This division, while giving independent status respectively to the husband and the wife, makes them both cogs in the great wheel of the family machine. And unless the wheels all smoothly interlock with each other, the machine will come to a standstill. This means that for the family to function as an efficient unit, there has to be full cooperation between husband and wife. Otherwise, it would mean the end of family life and, ultimately, of all social relations. Humanity as a whole would suffer.
The division of labour relates not only to men and women but is also a general principle upon which the whole system of nature is based.
When you establish a business house where many people have to work, you have to keep some people in the office to look after the office work, while some people have to be sent out to look after the field work. This division of labour is necessary to run any business successfully. If the workers of any factory or organization are not willing to accept this arrangement, that enterprise will certainly fail.
The same is true of ordinary living. For God has planned things so that men and women together will make them work. Then He has created (men and women) with the special abilities necessary to perform the jobs assigned to his or her sphere.
Now both reason and the shari‘ah demand that each sex should be willing to remain in his or her sphere and to perform the assigned tasks. Man should not try to imitate woman, and vice versa.
Those men and women who show their willingness to make this arrangement a success will, by the help of God, be rewarded in this life as well as in the next.
