Islamic laws took a great deal of care for woman and her rights in a way that included all aspects of her life, furthermore Islam teachings have honored the woman and asked that she is taken care of whether she was a mother, wife, daughter, sister or a relative in general.
If we look back in history, we would easily notice that woman have never had any acceptable rights in any of the previous legislation, nor by any old community as much as she got from the Islamic legislation.
To understand these rights given by Islam for woman we must review the woman rights history worldwide.
Roman civilization have treated woman as slave for man, she was supposed to have the rights of a minors or no rights at all, while ancient Indian laws admitted that epidemics, death, hell, poisons and snakes are far much better than a woman; it also admitted that the woman’s right to live ends by the death of her husband who is her lord and owner, therefore whenever she watches his dead body being cremated she cremates herself alive or she will be forever cursed.
With the Greeks, woman had no better chances as she was consider part of the assets owned by man , she was subject to be sold and bought by her man-owner.
As for the catholic church, the Danish writer Wieth Kundesen made clear how the women treatment looked like in the middle centuries, he quoted
“treating women was limited to the directions of the catholic church who considered the women as second degree creature”
As we come closer in history we notice that in 1586 a conference was held in France to determine whether women should be considered a human or non human creature, after a long discussion they attendees reach to a decision that she is a human but she was found as servant for man”
Staying in France, in February 1938 a new law has been put in force to cancel previous French laws that deprived the women from some financial rights, and with this new law the French women was able for the first time in history to open a personal bank account and control her own money.
In the French old law article 217 “Married women can’t give away or transfer the ownership of any of her assets, although she is the complete and sole owner for it, and even if her marriage is based on complete separate ownership with her Husband”
In the United Kingdom until year 1850, women was not considered as a citizen of the UK, furthermore women was not equal to men in their rights in the students unions and clubs of Oxford University except by a law issued in 26 July 1964.
When Islam came, prophet Muhammed insisted that woman is equal to man in all rights; furthermore she was exempted from any duties that are against her physiological and psychological nature such as duties requiring hard physiological strength.
Prophet Muhammed promised paradise for those who don’t favor their sons over their daughters as well as for those who have daughters and raise them and treat them well.
The holy Quran named one of its longest Suras ”Women”, in which Allah list all the rights of women and how she should be treated as well as many other related things.
In one of its verses (Women: 19) Allah says that husband should live in harmony with his wife and treat her well, and if he starts to dislike any of her actions then he shall not forget that many things which are sometimes disliked, turn out to be the best thing ever happened to you.
Prophet Muhammed said: “the best among you are those who treat their wives the best”.
In Islamic laws, man is supposed to financially support his wife that she never have to work for money and in return she take’s care of the household matters , raise children and share with her husband all his happiness and sorrow. This is very logical team work as the woman in her nature is more capable of handling children’s emotions and needs, while man in his nature is more capable of hard work and money earning. This should not be looked at in anyway as degradation of women, or favoring for men over women; Cause everybody is supposed to do what suits his nature best.
Any disturbance for this team work or switching of places will disturb the family and in return disturb the community.
Let’s take a simple example; If the manufacturers of a pick-up truck reduces the number of passenger seats in this truck to facilitate moving goods, Would anyone dare to say that the reduction of seats is a defect in the manufacturing, as we can’t find enough space to transport family; no, it’s the other way around the reduction of seats is the perfection itself because you are supposed to transport goods not passenger with this truck.
Same goes for women if she is more sentimental and emotional than man this should not be seen as a defect in her personality. It’s the perfection itself for what she is supposed to do.
Here lies the important truth that few are noticing: in a public opinion survey in the United States last year, it turned out that 86% of women prefer to go back and live in old ages where women didn’t have to work for money and stayed home to take care of household and family.
This is without declaring is the call to adopt the true Islamic family way of living, whereby man’s primary task is to earn money and financially support family while woman’s primary task is to take care of house and children and then both can equally share other responsibilities.