Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

Lifestyle Relationships
21

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

at times girls themselves don't like to mix up with the in-laws and restrict themselves to their bedrooms. they prefer to have their "me time" most of the times and give the impression to outsiders that their in-laws made them stick to their rooms.

what one see is not always what happens actually.

22

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

Well I think it is important to mention the rights of the spouses (in this case the wife) when people often don't differentiate between deen and culture. The speaker does seem to be someone whom people will listen to, so it's good that he mentions it.

23

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

Islam has placed the financial responsibility on the husband only..to maintain his family..and whatever the wife earns is her money..and this where many feminists quote the example of hazrat khadija RA and how she was a businesswoman..

what they dont want to acknowledge is..when the prophet's SAW mission started..she devoted all HER money for him and his cause..and never once objected to it or made it an ego issue..or made him feel low that he was using HER money for the cause of islam..
this is because they were a TEAM..and were not in competition with each other!

if the wife doesnt want to part with her income and rather spend it on personal luxuries while pressuring the husband alone to pay for an expensive education for their kids or a bigger house..then she should not hide behind the cloak of "a woman's income is her own in islam"

However,what is WRONG is if the guy spends his wife's money on his own family or invests them somewhere without her permission.

24

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

[NOTE]The off topic posts have been split into a separate thread. Please use the other thread for further discussions relating to FIL/BIL being mehrams. Thanks! [/NOTE]

25

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

Agreed Apricot. I think the provision that you can keep your own money is not to promote greed amongst women, but rather to prohibit men and their families from taking the money of their wife (earned or inherited), which often happens in Pakistan and India (not sure if this is common in arab countries).

It seems like it's more like stealing when you take the girl's inheritence, so less people seem to do that. But taking the girl's income and spending it on the guy's family as often she may be in a joint family, seems to be totally ok by some families.

Hence the provision that if you do give money to your husband and children, it becomes like a sadqa. This is probably in place to PROMOTE the habit of sharing.

But you can't argue that a provision IS NEEDED to protect girls from being made to work and then their income taken from them. In my own case, the guy I was wanting to marry said he would make all the financial decisions on our combined income, in which case, he deems himself to be the final owner of the money I make, which I found ridiculous. If we both make money, then we both make financial decisions. And I personally was never one to say that I will keep my money, however, in my personal case as with many other girls, I have a family too that I need to take care of.

I have no brother, who will take care of my parents as they age? Medical bills in the US are astronomical compared to Pakistan. Who pays those bills? My husband?

If my husband takes my money and makes all financial decisions on it, he can divert the money to where he pleases, and the day my family needs that money, I may not have access to it. That's just SCARY. And demeaning, and too dominating.

So I think Islam protects against this, but even Pakistanis don't know this stuff. He refused to believe it was an Islamic idea that a woman has ownership over her own money and gets to decide where it goes.

26

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

It becomes important. Financial decisions are daily decisions that can rip apart a family. Example: I know some woman who has a disabled child. Her husband foots the bills for the kid's therapy. She has inheritence money, and occasionally pulls it out when needed for the kid. But that inheritance money is from her dad. And her dad is also old, so she keeps it saved, so that if her father needs that money, then he can use it, reasoning that her husband's wealth is available for her child, but not for her dad.

So she has financial decisions over her own inheritence, and her husband cannot and usually does not ask her to pitch in for financial help, but if need arises, she does pitch in.

Is she being greedy? I'd like to think not, because she is keeping the money saved for a rainy day, which is not unreasonable.

27

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

^ why would she get inheritance if her dad is still alive.

Wouldn't it be wise for her dad to care of his own financial issues, retirement costs first and then dole out inheritance to his kids.

28

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

I dunno, I've seen some people in my family handing out inheritance to their daughters early in their life time as "gift" before Islamic law kicks in and other people in the family have access to the estate.

I don't believe my uncle gives her a line of her own finances actually. So her dad is her only source of cash. But I could be wrong. After all, I'm not a big fan of the uncle anyway. He does a crappy job in being a husband to her.

She doesn't work, her only money comes from dad, and if she buys luxuries like make-up etc and things, I think it comes from that money.

29

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

I have seen so many couples get divorced over this ONE issue.

30

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

which issue?

31

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

[QUOTE]
I dunno, I've seen some people in my family handing out inheritance to their daughters early in their life time as "gift" before Islamic law kicks in and other people in the family have access to the estate.
[/QUOTE]

I have seen it too but the purpose of is money is to help their children when the kids need the money the most. Early stages of career, paying off student debt, establishing businesses, life, kids. Honestly there is no use to handling out a large inheritance when the kids are in 40s - 50s already own their homes and are well off financially.

If I was the father or if it was my father, he would tell me to use the money on the son/daughter. He would reap more benefits from using money fowards therapy which would benefit his future life then the older uncle would.

that's just my POV.

32

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

"a woman's income is her own in islam"

The problem is you are willing to share everything. A home, kids and a bedroom but when it comes to money - you got separate bank accounts. I know it's allowed in Islam. I am not denying that but human factors of trust and shared contribution come into play. It gets nasty very quickly if not handled properly or with maturity. And honestly we know how mature young minds are in our early 20s.

When I got married my mom game this advice that everything in a marriage is "ours" not yours or mine. Even though we have separate cars. I don't say "my car" or "his car". Same thing with money.

There needs to be some guidance from our muslim Imams and leaders in "how to execute this properly without destroying a marriage"

33

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

This thread is about defending women's rights not about marriage destruction. stop posting offtopic posts please.....these are two distinct things.....PCG started the thread to discuss the former not the latter.

34

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

I don't even think even Islam actually advocates "my money is mine" attitude at the expense of damaging the relationship and breaking the marriage. This issue is quickly becoming on those Islamic teachings that'son the verge of being taken out of context to spread more fitna and fasad. So these facebook Imams really need to add bit more meat in their sermons and thoroughly explains the way such rulings should be implemented. Every ruling in Islam comes with context and reasons so it should be every Imam's utmost duty to first of all why the law exists, how it came into existence and what kind of terms and condition and flexibility a certain ruling holds.

35

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

Women’s rights are not fitna and fasaad…stop talibanisim :mad:

36

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

[QUOTE]
This thread is about defending women's rights not about marriage destruction. stop posting offtopic posts please.....these are two distinct things.....PCG started the thread to discuss the former not the latter.
[/QUOTE]

^ really? how's that off topic.

How about a women's right discuss societal impact of Islamic law (negative and positive) without people butting in. pun intended.
[QUOTE]

[QUOTE]

37

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

i am only here till PCG comes back :woho:

38

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

Easy there!

Are you even reading the posts? If they are not getting to you, just say so and move on.

39

Re: Working Women - the Islamic Perspective

Exactly. This.

The underlying issue here is decision making and input. There would be no need to invoke legal rights if both partners could communicate and compromise.

We have the legal right to do a lot of things, such as divorce, but wielding these rights as a threat of sorts results in the erosion of marital trust. Should people be educated about this issue? Yes. But unless these guys are controlling their wives incomes based on Islam (most likely, they're just controlling) the problem is not Islamic education but rather, marital counseling and maturity. For **both **parties.