A Woman’s Untapped Intellectual Potential
It is a tragedy of history that most men have made the same mistake: they have underutilized women. Every woman has the potential to be the finest intellectual partner for her husband, and such a partner is undoubtedly one of a man’s greatest assets. Yet most men fail to make use of this asset in its higher form. They continue to use it only at a lower level, until both leave this world.
By temperament, woman likes to adorn herself. (Quran, 43:18) It is the man’s responsibility to give this tendency a healthy direction. He should redirect the tendency towards physical adornment into a tendency towards intellectual development, so that woman may be able to play the role of an intellectual partner in his life.
But man often fails to do this. Instead, he turns this tendency into a means of his own pleasure. He himself desires to see woman in an attractive form. He treats her merely as a source of enjoyment. As a result, woman may spend her whole life mainly concerned with physical beauty. She does not develop her intellectual potential to the point where she can become a high-level intellectual partner for her spouse.
Guidance on this matter is found in a hadith. The Prophet Muhammad said: “Whoever loves his worldly life will harm his Hereafter, and whoever loves his Hereafter will harm his worldly life. So prefer what will remain over what will perish.” (Musnad Ahmad, Hadith No. 19697)
This hadith points to a law of nature: in this world, one often has to give up one thing in order to gain another. The same principle applies to married life. If a man wants his wife to become his intellectual partner, he must be willing to make a sacrifice: he must give up excessive concern for her physical attractiveness and become genuinely interested in her intellectual development.
Only through this sacrifice can a woman become, in the higher sense, an intellectual partner for her husband. This sacrifice is not merely a loss. It means giving up a smaller benefit in order to gain a greater one.
