Protection Vest

[Fadly]

Assalamualeikum fellow brothers. I have one question that have been nagging me for quite sometime now. you see, i'm a soldier. I was equipped with a some equipments to do my job. one of those were a protection vest. i've been wearing it for as long as my military service. but until recently, i've never bothered to find out more about the vest. recently, i've been googling information about my Protection vest. one thing that i found out is that, my protection vest are of multilayerd design. one of the layer are made of pure silk. now it's not permissible for Muslim male to wear silk. but in my line of job, i need those vest for safety reason. anyone here can help me unravelled this?

[MustafaMc]

Could the prohibition against men wearing silk and gold be related to Muslims not being ostentatious and not pretentiously showing off wealth? Silk is a very fine yet extremely strong fiber. The intention in your case is to capture this property of silk in the vest for protection not the property of being shiny and smooth to the touch. And Allah knows best.

[Muhammad]

:sl:

It is important to ask your question to a knowledgeable person for your specific situation, as there is nobody qualified to give a fatwa on the forum. You might find these two links from a fatwa site useful, but for further information I would suggest asking someone knowledgeable (such as an Imaam) Insha'Allaah.


Why are men not allowed to wear silk?

Wearing silk or part-silk

[S1aveofA11ah]

Asalaamualaikum

I emphasive what Muhammad above said about consulting a scholar for the right knowledge. However, I also have understood a principle in Islam which states that if/where there is a need then something that may be haram becomes permissible in that case - and Allah knows best (this is not making haram halal or vice versa).

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[Trn2allah]

A soldier for the sake of Allah??

[Makky]

The answer

Dear brother Fadly read the following Fatwa and see if its similar to your case or not..

Dear brother Mustafa we are not scholars...remember!

The fatwa:

Shaykh al-Islam [Ibn Taymiyah – may Allaah have mercy on him] was asked whether it is permissible for a soldier to wear silk or gold or silver when fighting or when the envoys of the enemy come to the Muslims.

He replied:

Praise be to Allaah. With regard to wearing silk in order to frighten the enemy, there are two scholarly views, the more correct of which is that it is allowed. The soldiers of Syria wrote to ‘Umar ibn al-Khattaab saying: “When we met the enemy we saw that they had covered their weapons with silk and we found that this struck terror in our hearts.” ‘Umar wrote back to them saying: “You should cover your weapons as they do.” And wearing silk is a kind of showing off, and Allaah likes showing off at the time of fighting, as it is narrated in al-Sunan that the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) said: “There is a kind of showing off that Allaah likes, and a kind of showing off that Allaah hates. The showing off that Allaah likes is when a man shows off at the time of war. The kind of showing off that Allaah hates is showing off for the purpose of pride and boasting.” On the day of Uhud, Abu Dujaanah al-Ansaari showed off among the ranks, and the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) said: “This is a kind of walking that Allaah hates except in this situation.” Majmoo’ al-Fataawa, 28/17

[MustafaMc]

Dear brother Mustafa we are not scholars...remember!

Yes, I know that I am not a scholar. Hence my ending of my post with "And Allah knows best" to indicate that I couldn't say it was right or wrong. If I make an error, never hesitate to point it out and correct it.

The fatwa:

Shaykh al-Islam [Ibn Taymiyah – may Allaah have mercy on him] was asked whether it is permissible for a soldier to wear silk or gold or silver when fighting or when the envoys of the enemy come to the Muslims.

He replied:

Praise be to Allaah. With regard to wearing silk in order to frighten the enemy, there are two scholarly views, the more correct of which is that it is allowed. ...

...but in this case the wearing of silk is an internal component part of a protective vest of which the silk is not readily apparent to an enemy to frighten him. By analogy, can we say that wearing the protective vest to protect one from shrapnel is better than not wearing it and possible getting seriously injured or killed?