Women

By Shaykh Hamza Yusuf, a renowned Muslim scholar:

[In a poem by Rumi:]

"Made attractive to men is love of desires…
God has made [woman] attractive, so how can men escape from her?
Even if a man is Rustam and greater than Hamzah,
still he is captive to his old woman’s command.

The Prophet, to whose speech the whole world
Was enslaved, used to say, “Speak to me, oh ‘Aishah!...”
The Prophet said that women totally dominate men of intellect and possessors of heart,
But ignorant men dominate women, for they are shackled by the ferocity of animals.
They have no kindness, gentleness, or love,
Since animality dominates their nature.
Love and kindness are human attributes, anger and sensuality belong to the animals.
She is the radiance of God, she is not your beloved.
She is the Creator – you could say she is not created.”

It is from women then, that men learn chastity and purity, which in turn protect the sacred nature of women, alluded to in the Arabic word for woman, hurmah, which means “what is sacred.” Now, the failure of men in imitating women in their natural virtue has resulted in women rejecting the double standard and imitating men in their natural vice. The spiritual power of women is great, but so too is the power of their physical attraction to men. It is this power that causes vile men to want to dominate women, and virtuous men to honor and protect them. But that physical power of the female form over men is a sensory power that veils men from her metaphysical meaning. Her sensual form prevents the man lost in carnality from knowing her spiritual reality, that she is the source of mercy in the world.

The Arabic and Hebrew word for womb (rahm) is derived from the word for mercy (rahma) and an expression of the creative power of God in man. In degrading woman, we degrade the highest qualities of our human nature; in elevating her, we elevate our highest nature. When her natural virtues—compassion, kindness, caring, selflessness, and love—predominate in men, men are able to overcome their natural vices and realize their full humanity. When, however, those virtues are absent, men descend to the lowest of the low and are worse than beasts. In unveiling the outward beauty of a woman, we become veiled from her inward beauty.

As a poet from the distant past wrote:

I said to my rose-cheeked lovely, “O you with bud-like mouth,
Why keep hiding your face, like flirting girls?”
She laughed and said,
“Unlike the beauties of your world,
In the veil I’m seen, but without it I’m hidden.