Flowers for the Women Wearing Veils - Volume I — Page 341
! ! 341 This upset her a great deal, but h e sa reassured her that youth would be restored to everyone before entering paradise. Consequently , t he Holy Prophet sa intended that women should give up ingratitude and increase their understanding. It is generally observed in children that at an early age , they have a poor understanding which improves with age. So now, when women are told they are deficient in understanding or in faith, are they to give up on their intelligence or faith? No, certainly not ! S imply because you are weak in faith, does not mean that you should give up your faith and sit on the side, but r ather that you should learn faith. We observe th at when children begin their schooling, they know nothing, but they learn and grow in knowledge. Should they quit at the beginning because they cannot read? In short, this was an admonition to abstain from ingratitude. Consider how great the favor is of t he Holy Prophet sa to wards women that before his advent women were treated as animals and were called every derogatory name. In fact, e ven now , several nations believe that women do not have a soul. Thus, how gracious was the Holy Prophet sa when he dictated that women and men are equal in humanity. We have observed that in some cases women are religious and men are weak in faith, women are wise and men are dull. In response to the Holy Prophet ’s sa great favor, it was the women’s responsibility to engage in the propagation of Islam as an expression of gratitude. However, the fault lies wholly with present day maulv i s who persuaded women that the ir mind and intellect was too weak to accomplish anything. Whereas on the other hand , t he Holy Prophet sa was challeng ing women’s sense of honor by pointing out that how can they enter paradise without committing virtuous deeds ? He pointed out that they fail to become intellectual and serve the faith. To acquire intellect , you need to work and in order to work you need to learn the skills to work. The fault lies with the maulv i s for teaching the opposite. Today, I have explain ed to you the truth about this Hadith , so that you may understand that this is what is meant by it.