format_quote Originally Posted by
hissa
In my Islam course that I'm taking in university, a group of students did a presentation on the rights of women in islam. Their presentation was fairly good, until they started to state how women in islam were even giving equal rights to lead prayer (a mixed gender prayer), and they used Umm Waraqa as "evidence" to prove their point. So the whole time I was like.. wha??
Ok, Islam does not allow women as imans in mixed congregational prayer, so can someone explain this to me:
Umm Waraqa bint Abdallah, an Ansari woman who was well versed in the Qurân, was instructed by Prophet Muhammad to lead ahl dariha (ahl dariha means the people of her home where 'dar' means home and can refer to one’s residence, neighborhood, or village), which consisted of both men and women, in prayer. The "people of Umm Waraqa’s home" were so numerous that Prophet Muhammad appointed a muezzin for her. Umm Waraqa was one of the few to hand down the Qurân before it was written.
Wa Aleykum Salam Sister,
First you need to explain many points to them on this matter.
But to come to the narration, then there is alot of assumption, look at what is said:
The "people of Umm Waraqa’s home" were so numerous that Prophet Muhammad appointed a muezzin for her.
Someone making Athan does not mean that there is a number of people present, this is either a mistake or a lie, and a grave one of the either, it could be two people present, or even ONE!!
On the authority of Uqbah ibn Amir (may Allah be pleased with him), who said: I heard the messenger of Allah (PBUH) say:
Your Lord delights at a shepherd who, on the peak of a mountain crag, gives the call to prayer and prays. Then Allah (glorified and exalted be He) say: Look at this servant of Mine, he gives the call to prayer and performs the prayers; he is in awe of Me. I have forgiven My servant [his sins] and have admitted him to Paradise.
It was related by an-Nasa'i with a good chain of authorities.
So even one person can give the call for prayer, it does not mean that the Athan is given so there must be alot of people, that alone shows the lack of knowledge of those who say such things!!
(ahl dariha means the people of her home where 'dar' means home and can refer to one’s residence, neighborhood, or village)
What have the scholars understood it to mean, what in the arabic language does it mean when used in this context?
Last but not least, there are other narrations that show that the people she was leading were other women!!
The narration of ad-Daaraqutnee48 specifies that Umm Waraqah was leading the women of her household in prayer. This becomes clearer when we consider that the narrations of al-Haakim49, al-Bayhaqee50, and Abu Nu'aym51 state that she was leading obligatory prayers. We know the importance that the Prophet, (sallallaahu 'aleyhi wa sallam' placed upon males' attending the obligatory prayers in the masjid;...
Taken from WHAT DID THE PROPHET DO? AN EVALUATION OF THE "ISLAMIC BASIS" OF A FEMALE LED PRAYER
The narrations numbers had footnotes:
48 At-Ta'leew al-Mughnee 'alaa Sunan ad-Daaraqutnee (Pakistan: Nashr as-Sunnah) vol. 1, p. 279. Ahmed al-Banna mentions this narration in his Buloogh al-Amaanee, which is Reda's primary source in her research, on the very page to which Reda refers us in her footnote. It would, accordingly, be difficult to avoid the conclusion that she was aware of this clarifying narration, and deliberately concealed it fom her readers.
49 #733
50 As-Sunnan al-Kubraa (Riyadh: Maktabah ar-Rushd, 1425) vol.3, p.194
51 Hilyah al-Awliyaa' vol.2, p.63
Also, to remove doubt the article goes on to say:
This, accordingly, is what most scholars have understood the hadeeth to mean: that Umm Waraqah was leading the female members of her household. Ibn Khuzaymah reported the hadeeth in his Saheeh under the heading, "A Woman Leading Other Women in the Obligatory Prayer."52 Ad-Daaraqutnee placed it in a chapter he entitled, "Women Praying with a Woman Leading Them."53 And Al-Bayhaqee's heading was even more explicit: "A Woman Leading Other Women, Not Men."54
Footnotes:
52 #1676
53 At-Ta'leeq al-Mughnee 'alaa Sunan ad-Daaraqutnee; vol.1, p. 279
54 As-Sunan As- Sughraa (555)
I hope that helps insha'Allah.
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