Gender roles in Islam - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

This article is about gender roles, in families and relationships between men and women, in Islam. For other related topics, including Islamic women's clothing and other differences in Islamic law between the sexes, see Women and Islam.

In Islam

Islam

Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

, the sexes are considered equal before God in the complementarian sense. Allah says in verse 13 of chapter 49 in the Holy Qu'ran: "O mankind! We have created you from a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes, that you may know one another. Verily, the most honourable of you with Allâh is that (believer) who has At-Taqwa. Verily, Allâh is All-Knowing, All-Aware." At the same time, Islamic law and practice recognize differences between sexes, resulting in different rights and obligations.

Qur'an instructs believers that they should not treat women as a commodity which can be inherited and used as liked. The context is that in the pre-Islamic era, the wives of a person could be transferred to his heirs like his wealth and animals.

In many Islamic societies, there is a division of roles creating a woman’s space in the private sphere

Private sphere

The private sphere is the complement or opposite to the public sphere. The private sphere is a certain sector of societal life in which an individual enjoys a degree of authority, unhampered by interventions from governmental or other institutions. Examples of the private sphere are family and home...

of the home and a man’s in the public sphere

Public sphere

The public sphere is an area in social life where individuals can come together to freely discuss and identify societal problems, and through that discussion influence political action...

. In Islam, a woman's primary responsibility is usually interpreted as fulfilling her role as a wife and mother, where as a man’s role is to work and be able to financially support his wife and family. However neither the Qu'ran nor the Hadith specifically mention gender roles for women.

Under the Qur'an, "Men are the maintainers of women because Allah has made some of them to excel others and because they spend out of their property; the good women are therefore obedient..." According to Sayyid Qutb

Sayyid Qutb

Sayyid Qutb was an Egyptian author, educator, Islamist theorist, poet, and the leading member of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood in the 1950s and '60s....

as outlined by John Esposito, however, this passage does not imply the "squashing (of) the woman's personalty or her civic rights;rather it is an obligation to direct and protect the family." According to Qutb's analysis, the Quran "gives the man the right of 'guardianship' or 'superiority' over the family structure in order to prevent dissension and friction between the spouses. The equity of this system lies in the fact that God both favoured the man with the necessary qualities and skills for the 'guardianship' and also charged him with the duty to provide for the structure's upkeep."

Family

The Qu'ran states that unless a wife is guilty of open sexual transgression, a believer should not subject his wife to harsh treatment, even if he dislikes his wife. If a believer behaves in a good manner to his wife even though he doesn't like her, the Qur'an used the word Asā (‘عَسَى’), which implies in this context a promise from God of a great reward.

Modern scholars say that the Qur'an instructs husbands to deal with their wives according to good conventions and traditions of a society and emphasize the importance of taking counsel and mutual agreement in family decisions.

Similarly, it is attributed to Muhammad

Muhammad

Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...

Fear Allah in respect of women.
The best of you are they who behave best to their wives.
A Muslim must not hate his wife, and if he be displeased with one bad quality in her, let him be pleased with one that is good.
The more civil and kind a Muslim is to his wife, the more perfect in faith he is.

In many Islamic societies, there is a division of roles creating a woman’s space in the private sphere of the home and a man’s in the public sphere. A woman's primary responsibility is usually interpreted as fulfilling her role as a wife and mother, whereas a man’s role is to work and be able to financially support his wife and family.

Gender roles in prayer and worship

On Fridays many Muslims pray in congregation, and men, women, and children are segregated into separate groups. Every other day in the home the family prays together. The man will lead the prayers, as he is considered the head of the household. His wife and children will stand behind him as they pray.

Gender roles within marriage

Muhammad described the high status of mothers in both of the major hadith Collections (Bukhari and Muslim). One famous account is:

"A man asked the Prophet: 'Whom should I honor most?' The Prophet replied: 'Your mother'. 'And who comes next?' asked the man. The Prophet replied: 'Your mother'. 'And who comes next?' asked the man. The Prophet replied: 'Your mother!'. 'And who comes next?' asked the man. The Prophet replied: 'Your father'"

In Islam, the primary role played by women is to be mothers, and mothers are considered the most important part of the family. A well known Hadith of the prophet says: "I asked the Prophet who has the greatest right over a man, and he said, 'His mother'". While a woman is considered the most important member of the family, she is not the head of the family. Therefore, it is possible to conclude that importance has no relevance with being the head of the family.

Other genders

In Islam, the term mukhannathun

Mukhannathun

Mukhannathun is classical Arabic for people who would now be called transgender women, perhaps poorly distinguished from eunuchs. Various "mukhannathun" appear in several hadith. In one hadith the prophet Muhammad banishes a mukhannath to a region near Medina, but prohibits people from killing...

is used to describe gender-variant people, usually male-to-female transsexuals. Neither this term nor the equivalent for "eunuch" occurs in the Qur'an

Qur'an

The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...

, but the term does appear in the Hadith

Hadith

The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....

, the sayings of Muhammad, which have a secondary status to the central text. Moreover, within Islam

Islam

Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

, there is a tradition on the elaboration and refinement of extended religious doctrines through scholarship. This doctrine contains a trans-positive passage by the scholar and hadith collector An-Nawawi:

Iran carries out more sex change operations than any other nation in the world except for Thailand

Thailand

Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...

. It is sanctioned as a supposed "cure" for homosexuality, which is punishable by death under Iranian law. The government even provides up to half the cost for those needing financial assistance and a sex change is recognised on the birth certificate.

Family

Gender roles in prayer and worship

Gender roles within marriage

Other genders

See also