Covering of the eyes
Encyclopedia
The phrase "covering of eyes" is found in . It is translated literally in Young's Literal Translation
. The King James Version inserts the definite article "the", absent in the original text. Almost all other versions treat it as a figurative expression, and translate it according to the meaning, not the individual words.
of Gerar
is speaking to Abraham
and his wife Sarah
whom he had taken as his wife thinking her Abraham's sister
:
The King James Version translates as follows:
One commentator has interpreted the phrase as implied advice to Sarah to conform to a supposed custom of married women, and wear a complete veil
, covering the eyes as well as the rest of the face, but the phrase is generally taken to refer not to Sarah's eyes, but to the eyes of others, and to be merely a metaphorical expression concerning vindication of Sarah (NASB
, RSV
), silencing criticism (GWT), allaying suspicions (NJB
), righting a wrong (BBE
, NLT
), covering or recompensing the problem caused her (NIV
, NLV
, TNIV
, JB
), a sign of her innocence (ESV
, CEV
, HCSB
). The final phrase in the verse, which KJV takes to mean "she was reproved", is taken by almost all other versions to mean instead "she was vindicated", and the word "הוא", which KJV interprets as "he" (Abraham), is interpreted as "it" (the money).
Abimelech's statement to Sarah about the giving of 1000 pieces of silver is interpreted in the midrash
, and sometimes elsewhere, as a curse and re-translated "... his eyes", in order to interpret it as the reason for Isaac
's later blindness in his old age. Such a curse was seen as righteously carried out, since Abraham's deliberate deceit was to blame for Abimelech's innocent error, and hence its visitation on Abraham's son was considered just. More modern critical readings view it simply as an instruction to purchase a veil for Sarah, so that she would be clearly identified as being married, in which case it forms a sly reproach against her for not already wearing one.
The Jewish Encyclopedia
agreeing with the general view, namely that the phrase has nothing to do with a material veil, states that Abimelech wants his wrongdoing overlooked in exchange for silver in a kind of ransom
(kofer-nefesh, similar to the Teutonic Weregild
).
which covers the eyes, as well as the rest of the face
. This kind of veil was traditionally worn by married Muslim
women in the middle ages
. Some Salafi
women in the Arab
countries of the Persian Gulf
such as Saudi Arabia
, Yemen
, Qatar
, Bahrain
, Oman
and UAE and parts of Iran
may still continue to wear eye-veils, but even in those countries this practice is no longer widespread.
In the modern world, Salafiyyah is the only Islamic school of thought and jurisprudence
that believes that a woman’s awrah
in front of unrelated men is her entire body including her face and hands.
Other groups exclude the face and the hands from the awrah parts.
However, the eye-veil issue is regarded differently by the various Salafi
scholars and has continued to arouse debate between Salafi scholars particularly in Saudi Arabia
.
Most Saudi scholars hold the opinion that it is permissible for a woman to show her eyes.
However, recently, the religious authority in Mecca
, Mohammad Habadan called on women to wear veils that reveal only one eye, so that women would not be encouraged to use eye make-up. The cleric has insisted that the one-eye niqab was prescribed in the following Hadiths:
Some other Saudi scholars have argued that the reason women permitted to show one of their eyes was that, if they did not, they could not see the way- and that there is no need to expose the eyes in the modern world as women can cover their eyes with nets or sheer layers so as not to be a cause of attraction without having their vision restricted.
Another Saudi Shaikh Muhammad ibn Saalih al-‘Uthaymeen has remarked: “If you say that it is allowed for women to wear Niqab and uncover their eyes and look out from behind the Niqab, within a short time the hole in this niqab would widen to include the eyebrows, forehead and cheeks, then the cover would decrease until the whole face is exposed. This is well known to be the way of women, so shutting the door to that is the best way.”
Saudi Niqabs consists of an upper band that is tied around the forehead, together with a long wide piece which covers the face, leaving an opening for the eyes. Many also have two or more sheer layers attached to the upper band, which can be worn flipped down to cover the eyes or left over the top of the head.
Contrary to common belief, eye veils do not generally restrict vision any more than a dark pair of sunglasses would. Although a person looking at a woman wearing a niqab with an eyeveil would not be able to see her eyes, she is able to see out through the thin fabric.
Young's Literal Translation
Young's Literal Translation is a translation of the Bible into English, published in 1862. The translation was made by Robert Young, compiler of Young's Analytical Concordance to the Bible and Concise Critical Comments on the New Testament. Young produced a "Revised Version" of the translation in...
. The King James Version inserts the definite article "the", absent in the original text. Almost all other versions treat it as a figurative expression, and translate it according to the meaning, not the individual words.
The verse
The verse appears when king AbimelechAbimelech
Abimelech was a common name of the Philistine kings.Abimelech was most prominently the name of a king of Gerar who is mentioned in two of the three wife-sister narratives in Genesis...
of Gerar
Gerar
Gerar - meaning "lodging-place" - was a Philistine town and district in what is today south central Israel. Archaeological evidence points to the town having come into existence with the arrival of the Philistines at around 1200 BC and having been little more than a village until 800-700...
is speaking to Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
and his wife Sarah
Sarah
Sarah or Sara was the wife of Abraham and the mother of Isaac as described in the Hebrew Bible and the Quran. Her name was originally Sarai...
whom he had taken as his wife thinking her Abraham's sister
Wife-sister narratives in Genesis
There are three wife-sister narratives in Genesis, part of the Torah, all of which are strikingly similar. At the core of each is the tale of a Biblical Patriarch, who has come to be in the land of a powerful foreign overlord who misidentifies the Patriarch's wife as the Patriarch's sister, and...
:
וּלְשָׂרָה אָמַר, הִנֵּה נָתַתִּי אֶלֶף כֶּסֶף לְאָחִיךְ--הִנֵּה הוּא-לָךְ כְּסוּת עֵינַיִם, לְכֹל אֲשֶׁר אִתָּךְ; וְאֵת כֹּל, וְנֹכָחַת.
The King James Version translates as follows:
- "And unto SarahSarahSarah or Sara was the wife of Abraham and the mother of Isaac as described in the Hebrew Bible and the Quran. Her name was originally Sarai...
heAbimelechAbimelech was a common name of the Philistine kings.Abimelech was most prominently the name of a king of Gerar who is mentioned in two of the three wife-sister narratives in Genesis...
said, Behold, I have given thy brother a thousand pieces of silver: behold, he is to thee a covering of the eyes, unto all that are with thee, and with all other: thus she was reproved"
One commentator has interpreted the phrase as implied advice to Sarah to conform to a supposed custom of married women, and wear a complete veil
Veil
A veil is an article of clothing, worn almost exclusively by women, that is intended to cover some part of the head or face.One view is that as a religious item, it is intended to show honor to an object or space...
, covering the eyes as well as the rest of the face, but the phrase is generally taken to refer not to Sarah's eyes, but to the eyes of others, and to be merely a metaphorical expression concerning vindication of Sarah (NASB
New American Standard Bible
The New American Standard Bible , also informally called New American Standard Version , is an English translation of the Bible....
, RSV
Revised Standard Version
The Revised Standard Version is an English translation of the Bible published in the mid-20th century. It traces its history to William Tyndale's New Testament translation of 1525. The RSV is an authorized revision of the American Standard Version of 1901...
), silencing criticism (GWT), allaying suspicions (NJB
New Jerusalem Bible
The New Jerusalem Bible is a Roman Catholic translation of the Bible published in 1985 by Darton, Longman & Todd and Les Editions du Cerf, and edited by the Reverend Henry Wansbrough.- Contents :...
), righting a wrong (BBE
Bible in Basic English
The Bible In Basic English is a translation of the Bible into Basic English. The BBE was translated by Professor S. H. Hooke using the standard 850 Basic English words. 100 words that were helpful to understand poetry were added along with 50 "Bible" words for a total of 1,000 words total...
, NLT
New Living Translation
The New Living Translation is a translation of the Bible into modern English. Originally starting out as an effort to revise The Living Bible, the project evolved into a new English translation from Hebrew and Greek texts...
), covering or recompensing the problem caused her (NIV
New International Version
The New International Version is an English translation of the Christian Bible. Published by Zondervan in the United States and by Hodder & Stoughton in the UK, it has become one of the most popular modern translations in history.-History:...
, NLV
NLV
The abbreviation NLV may represent:* North Las Vegas* Mykolaiv Airport, as the airport's IATA code* Norwalk-like viruses, which is the previous name for noroviruses* National Library of Vietnam in Vietnamese) Thư viện Quốc gia Việt Nam...
, TNIV
Today's New International Version
Today's New International Version is an English translation of the Bible developed by the Committee on Bible Translation. The CBT also developed the New International Version in the 1970s. The TNIV is based on the NIV. It is explicitly Protestant like its predecessor; the deuterocanonical books...
, JB
Jerusalem Bible
The Jerusalem Bible is a Roman Catholic translation of the Bible which first was introduced to the English-speaking public in 1966 and published by Darton, Longman & Todd...
), a sign of her innocence (ESV
English Standard Version
The English Standard Version is an English translation of the Christian Bible. It is a revision of the 1971 edition of the Revised Standard Version...
, CEV
Contemporary English Version
The Contemporary English Version or CEV is a translation of the Bible into English,published by the American Bible Society...
, HCSB
Holman Christian Standard Bible
The Holman Christian Standard Bible is a modern English Bible translation from Holman Bible Publishers. The first full edition was completed in March 2004, with the New Testament alone having been previously published in 1999.- Beginnings :...
). The final phrase in the verse, which KJV takes to mean "she was reproved", is taken by almost all other versions to mean instead "she was vindicated", and the word "הוא", which KJV interprets as "he" (Abraham), is interpreted as "it" (the money).
Abimelech's statement to Sarah about the giving of 1000 pieces of silver is interpreted in the midrash
Midrash
The Hebrew term Midrash is a homiletic method of biblical exegesis. The term also refers to the whole compilation of homiletic teachings on the Bible....
, and sometimes elsewhere, as a curse and re-translated "... his eyes", in order to interpret it as the reason for Isaac
Isaac
Isaac as described in the Hebrew Bible, was the only son Abraham had with his wife Sarah, and was the father of Jacob and Esau. Isaac was one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites...
's later blindness in his old age. Such a curse was seen as righteously carried out, since Abraham's deliberate deceit was to blame for Abimelech's innocent error, and hence its visitation on Abraham's son was considered just. More modern critical readings view it simply as an instruction to purchase a veil for Sarah, so that she would be clearly identified as being married, in which case it forms a sly reproach against her for not already wearing one.
The Jewish Encyclopedia
Jewish Encyclopedia
The Jewish Encyclopedia is an encyclopedia originally published in New York between 1901 and 1906 by Funk and Wagnalls. It contained over 15,000 articles in 12 volumes on the history and then-current state of Judaism and the Jews as of 1901...
agreeing with the general view, namely that the phrase has nothing to do with a material veil, states that Abimelech wants his wrongdoing overlooked in exchange for silver in a kind of ransom
Ransom
Ransom is the practice of holding a prisoner or item to extort money or property to secure their release, or it can refer to the sum of money involved.In an early German law, a similar concept was called bad influence...
(kofer-nefesh, similar to the Teutonic Weregild
Weregild
Weregild was a value placed on every human being and every piece of property in the Salic Code...
).
In Arabic countries
Covering of the Eyes(Arabic:غطاء العین) is a veilVeil
A veil is an article of clothing, worn almost exclusively by women, that is intended to cover some part of the head or face.One view is that as a religious item, it is intended to show honor to an object or space...
which covers the eyes, as well as the rest of the face
Face
The face is a central sense organ complex, for those animals that have one, normally on the ventral surface of the head, and can, depending on the definition in the human case, include the hair, forehead, eyebrow, eyelashes, eyes, nose, ears, cheeks, mouth, lips, philtrum, temple, teeth, skin, and...
. This kind of veil was traditionally worn by married Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
women in the middle ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
. Some Salafi
Salafi
A Salafi come from Sunni Islam is a follower of an Islamic movement, Salafiyyah, that is supposed to take the Salaf who lived during the patristic period of early Islam as model examples...
women in the Arab
Arab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
countries of the Persian Gulf
Persian Gulf
The Persian Gulf, in Southwest Asia, is an extension of the Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.The Persian Gulf was the focus of the 1980–1988 Iran-Iraq War, in which each side attacked the other's oil tankers...
such as Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia , commonly known in British English as Saudi Arabia and in Arabic as as-Sa‘ūdiyyah , is the largest state in Western Asia by land area, constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and the second-largest in the Arab World...
, Yemen
Yemen
The Republic of Yemen , commonly known as Yemen , is a country located in the Middle East, occupying the southwestern to southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea to the west, and Oman to the east....
, Qatar
Qatar
Qatar , also known as the State of Qatar or locally Dawlat Qaṭar, is a sovereign Arab state, located in the Middle East, occupying the small Qatar Peninsula on the northeasterly coast of the much larger Arabian Peninsula. Its sole land border is with Saudi Arabia to the south, with the rest of its...
, Bahrain
Bahrain
' , officially the Kingdom of Bahrain , is a small island state near the western shores of the Persian Gulf. It is ruled by the Al Khalifa royal family. The population in 2010 stood at 1,214,705, including 235,108 non-nationals. Formerly an emirate, Bahrain was declared a kingdom in 2002.Bahrain is...
, Oman
Oman
Oman , officially called the Sultanate of Oman , is an Arab state in southwest Asia on the southeast coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by the United Arab Emirates to the northwest, Saudi Arabia to the west, and Yemen to the southwest. The coast is formed by the Arabian Sea on the...
and UAE and parts of Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
may still continue to wear eye-veils, but even in those countries this practice is no longer widespread.
In the modern world, Salafiyyah is the only Islamic school of thought and jurisprudence
Jurisprudence
Jurisprudence is the theory and philosophy of law. Scholars of jurisprudence, or legal theorists , hope to obtain a deeper understanding of the nature of law, of legal reasoning, legal systems and of legal institutions...
that believes that a woman’s awrah
Awrah
Awrah or Awrat is a term used within Islam which denotes the intimate parts of the body, for both men and women, which must be covered with clothing. Exposing the awrah is unlawful in Islam and is regarded as sin...
in front of unrelated men is her entire body including her face and hands.
Other groups exclude the face and the hands from the awrah parts.
However, the eye-veil issue is regarded differently by the various Salafi
Salafi
A Salafi come from Sunni Islam is a follower of an Islamic movement, Salafiyyah, that is supposed to take the Salaf who lived during the patristic period of early Islam as model examples...
scholars and has continued to arouse debate between Salafi scholars particularly in Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia , commonly known in British English as Saudi Arabia and in Arabic as as-Sa‘ūdiyyah , is the largest state in Western Asia by land area, constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and the second-largest in the Arab World...
.
Most Saudi scholars hold the opinion that it is permissible for a woman to show her eyes.
However, recently, the religious authority in Mecca
Mecca
Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...
, Mohammad Habadan called on women to wear veils that reveal only one eye, so that women would not be encouraged to use eye make-up. The cleric has insisted that the one-eye niqab was prescribed in the following Hadiths:
- Ibn Sireen has said: “I asked ‘Abīdah as Salmaani about the statement of Allah: “O Prophet! Tell your wives and your daughters and the women of the believers to draw their Jalābīb all over their bodies…” So he took his garment and covered his head and his face but he covered his left eye, leaving the right eye esposed. Then he drew his garment from above making it close to his eyebrow, or upon his eyebrow.
- Ibn Abbas has said: “Allah commanded the believing women, when going out of their homes for some need, to cover their faces from above their heads with their Jilbābs, leaving one eye to see the path.” Tafsir TabariTafsir al-TabariJāmi` al-bayān `an ta'wīl āy al-Qur'ān, popularly Tafsīr al-Ṭabarī is a classic Sunni tafsir by the Persian scholar Muhammad ibn Jarir al-Tabari...
1:4:148
Some other Saudi scholars have argued that the reason women permitted to show one of their eyes was that, if they did not, they could not see the way- and that there is no need to expose the eyes in the modern world as women can cover their eyes with nets or sheer layers so as not to be a cause of attraction without having their vision restricted.
Another Saudi Shaikh Muhammad ibn Saalih al-‘Uthaymeen has remarked: “If you say that it is allowed for women to wear Niqab and uncover their eyes and look out from behind the Niqab, within a short time the hole in this niqab would widen to include the eyebrows, forehead and cheeks, then the cover would decrease until the whole face is exposed. This is well known to be the way of women, so shutting the door to that is the best way.”
Saudi Niqabs consists of an upper band that is tied around the forehead, together with a long wide piece which covers the face, leaving an opening for the eyes. Many also have two or more sheer layers attached to the upper band, which can be worn flipped down to cover the eyes or left over the top of the head.
Contrary to common belief, eye veils do not generally restrict vision any more than a dark pair of sunglasses would. Although a person looking at a woman wearing a niqab with an eyeveil would not be able to see her eyes, she is able to see out through the thin fabric.