The suffering of women in the time of Moses, peace be upon him | Episode (1)

0:00 The Story of Woman's Suffering in the Era of Moses, peace be upon him

0:06 All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of all creation,

0:12 and may peace and blessings be upon the most noble of prophets and messengers,

0:16 our Prophet Muhammad,

0:18 and upon all his family and Companions.

0:21 To proceed:

0:22 Allah created woman to be a source of tranquility for man,

0:27 so our mother Eve was a source of solace for our father Adam, peace be upon him.

0:32 And for this tranquility to be realized,

0:35 Allah placed affection and mercy in the hearts of both man and woman

0:39 from the very first lawful look,

0:41 which is itself one of the great signs of Allah,

0:45 warranting deep reflection and contemplation.

0:48 Allah the Exalted said:

0:50 “And of His signs is this: He created for you helpmeets from yourselves that ye might find rest in them, and He ordained between you love and mercy. Lo! herein indeed are portents for folk who reflect.” (30:21)

0:58 "that you may find tranquility in them,"

1:01 “And of His signs is this: He created for you helpmeets from yourselves that ye might find rest in them, and He ordained between you love and mercy. Lo! herein indeed are portents for folk who reflect.” (30:21)

1:06 "Indeed in that are signs for a people who give thought."

1:14 Al-Tha'alibi, may Allah have mercy on him, said:

1:18 "A man does not find comfort in anything

1:20 as he does in an agreeable, supportive wife;

1:25 for Allah, exalted is His Name, says [this],

1:28 “And of His signs is this: He created for you helpmeets from yourselves that ye might find rest in them, and He ordained between you love and mercy. Lo! herein indeed are portents for folk who reflect.” (30:21)

1:35 “And of His signs is this: He created for you helpmeets from yourselves that ye might find rest in them, and He ordained between you love and mercy. Lo! herein indeed are portents for folk who reflect.” (30:21)

1:39 and He did not single out this quality for anyone other than women.

1:43 That is why a man may leave his parents, his children, and all others beside them for the sake of his wife,

1:49 and that is why no one cares for another

1:52 quite like a righteous woman cares for her husband,

1:55 in her deep compassion for him and his family.

1:58 A man's household affairs and his dignity can hardly be sustained

2:02 except through a noble, tender-hearted, elevated woman

2:05 who is righteous and chaste;

2:07 otherwise, his affairs fall apart and his means are thrown into disarray."

2:11 For as soon as the marriage contract is signed, this woman

2:16 turns toward this previously unfamiliar man with her entire being and full joy,

2:22 feeling a strong emotional bond toward him from the very first day.

2:27 Yet if that man were told

2:29 to forge such a bond in a single night on his own, he could never manage it.

2:34 Furthermore, this mercy that the man experiences in his heart toward this woman—

2:40 if he were asked how it came to reside in his heart from the very first night,

2:44 he would not be able to explain it.

2:48 Thus families were formed and societies established,

2:52 and mankind has lived by this sacred bond

2:55 ever since Allah created our father Adam and our mother Eve,

2:59 and so it will remain until Allah inherits the earth and all upon it.

3:04 Nevertheless, across human history,

3:07 there have been eras in which women were severely wronged,

3:10 their worth degraded,

3:12 and they endured immense suffering

3:14 because people strayed far from the religion of Allah which He revealed to His messengers.

3:19 People fabricated customs and traditions for themselves

3:23 founded upon base desires, ignorance, and superstition;

3:26 indeed, they worshipped entities other than Allah, the Mighty and Majestic,

3:29 and enacted man-made laws for themselves for which Allah sent down no authority.

3:36 And it is the inherent nature of any legislation devised by human beings

3:40 that it serves the interests of those who created it—the powerful and influential within society—

3:46 and this inevitably leads to the oppression of the vulnerable in that society.

3:51 Thus, there is no man-made legislation on earth invented by people themselves

3:56 that grants everyone their due rights and fulfills their true interests,

4:00 because whoever crafts such laws prioritizes himself, his influence, his interests, and his clique,

4:06 disregarding the welfare of the people.

4:08 And it is observable that the most oppressed by man-made laws throughout pre-Islamic history,

4:15 as well as in our own contemporary era after turning away from the law of Allah

4:19 and adhering instead to positive secular laws and international conventions—

4:23 I say: the most oppressed of all has been woman.

4:27 Among the ancient Greeks, woman was regarded as an abomination;

4:31 she was enslaved, devoid of any rights whatsoever,

4:35 bought and sold like chattel.

4:37 When she rebelled against that reality,

4:40 she was degraded and cheapened across every public forum and gathering,

4:44 freely mingling with men

4:46 who took from her the most precious thing she possessed,

4:49 only to abandon her to endure her pain all alone.

4:54 As for the Romans,

4:56 she was the property of her father,

4:58 possessing no right to dispose of whatever she owned;

5:01 and when she rebelled against her condition,

5:04 they granted her the property right to sell herself

5:07 to whomever she pleased after her father's death.

5:10 And if she married,

5:12 all authority and rights transferred entirely to her husband,

5:15 leaving her with no right to anything.

5:18 As for the Hindus,

5:19 they recognized no right to life for a woman

5:22 after the death of her husband;

5:24 she was burned alive alongside his corpse,

5:28 and was regarded by them as the vile creature on the face of the earth.

5:32 And when the Jews corrupted the Torah,

5:35 they legislated the contempt and degradation of woman,

5:38 depriving her of inheritance.

5:40 They considered her a curse,

5:42 claiming she seduced our father Adam

5:45 and caused his expulsion from Paradise.

5:47 Furthermore, when she menstruated,

5:49 they deemed her completely impure,

5:51 and that she contaminated everything

5:53 she touched with her hand;

5:55 so they completely ostracized her,

5:57 neither eating or sitting with her,

6:00 nor sharing a bed with her.

6:02 And the Christians, just like the Jews,

6:04 when they corrupted their religion,

6:06 they humiliated woman

6:08 and viewed her as the gateway of Satan

6:10 for temptation and seduction.

6:12 In one of their church councils, they even debated

6:14 the very nature of woman:

6:16 is she a human being, or not a human being?

6:19 As for the Arabs during the pre-Islamic Jahiliyyah,

6:22 they buried her alive in the sand

6:24 out of fear of shame and disgrace.

6:26 And any woman who survived and was not buried alive

6:29 had no right to choose marriage,

6:31 nor to inheritance, nor to personal freedom;

6:33 her lot in life was an omen of bad luck

6:35 from the very moment of her birth.

6:37 As for what is termed

6:39 contemporary Western civilization,

6:41 which emerged in the wake of

6:43 the French Revolution,

6:45 woman's status within it did not truly shift

6:47 toward honor and dignity.

6:49 Rather, matters have reached the point today

6:51 where woman is exploited

6:53 for their base pleasures and commercial gratification;

6:55 they deluded her into believing that

6:57 sleeping with whatever men she pleases

6:59 is a freedom she ought to pursue

7:01 and demand,

7:03 and then codified that

7:05 into secular laws formulated

7:07 by human beings.

7:09 They imposed this upon nations

7:11 under the guise of treaties, accords,

7:13 and international declarations,

7:15 through which they waged war against the Sharia of Islam—

7:17 the very law that did justice to woman,

7:19 granted her true rights,

7:21 which humanity had usurped from her

7:23 when they turned away from following the messengers.

7:25 Indeed, woman suffered in the West

7:27 during the era of feudalism,

7:29 and suffered throughout the era of

7:31 the Industrial Revolution,

7:33 and she suffered in the era of so-called

7:35 liberation;

7:37 throughout all these epochs,

7:39 her honor and chastity were constantly bargained away,

7:41 and she was exploited

7:43 to fulfill the greedy ambitions of the barons

7:45 of wealth and power,

7:47 only to be discarded into the gutter

7:49 to endure her misery alone.

7:51 Nor was the Communist revolution,

7:53 the Bolshevik liberation,

7:55 any better in its treatment

7:57 of woman;

7:59 rather, they lied to her,

8:01 turning her into common public property,

8:03 enjoyed by whomever wished,

8:05 leaving her stripped of all genuine rights.

8:08 And woman's freedom

8:10 and the human rights championed

8:12 by the West today

8:14 vanish into thin air wherever wars break out:

8:16 consider the Syrian woman

8:18 suffering in refugee camps;

8:20 the Sudanese woman,

8:22 conspired against and assaulted in her own home;

8:24 and before her, the Somali woman

8:26 in the "Restore Hope" military campaign,

8:28 which utterly extinguished all hope;

8:30 and likewise every

8:32 Muslim woman across corners

8:34 of the globe being crushed by war.

8:36 Anyone who closely follows what

8:38 the Americans did to the women

8:40 of Iraq would die of sheer grief and heartbreak

8:42 over the bitter state of this Ummah.

8:44 Is there truly

8:46 any suffering greater than the suffering

8:48 of woman across human history?

8:50 She has been systematically wronged at the hands of

8:52 the barons of wealth and power

8:54 among the disbelievers, atheists,

8:56 and those who deviated from following

8:58 the messengers. And joining them

9:00 in their oppression of woman

9:02 were those who outwardly claim adherence to Islam,

9:04 by turning her away from the law of Allah

9:06 and driving her

9:08 toward corruption, immorality, and debauchery,

9:10 only for her to live in wretchedness thereafter

9:12 once the profligate and corrupt

9:14 have finished exploiting her

9:16 for their vice. And the common

9:19 denominator uniting all who have wronged

9:21 woman across history

9:23 is turning away from the revealed law of Allah

9:25 and fabricating man-made codes

9:27 that humiliate woman,

9:29 all while falsely claiming to champion the welfare

9:31 woman.

9:33 Whoever examines these laws

9:35 realizes this full well.

9:37 So what was the suffering

9:39 of women in the era of Moses,

9:41 peace be upon him?

9:43 In this series,

9:45 we will discuss, if Allah wills,

9:47 the status of women in the era of Moses,

9:49 peace be upon him.

9:51 And we shall continue in an upcoming session,

9:53 if Allah wills.

9:55 And all praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds.

10:01 The story of the suffering

10:03 of women in the era of Moses,

10:05 peace be upon him.

The suffering of women in the time of Moses, peace be upon him | Episode (1) | Introduction

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