Feature: She has a Masters, She has a Doctorate, She is ambitious - She's not a good wife material
 |
| Image source: Photo Jude |
Marriage is an important institution given to us by Allah without which the world will be plunged into trials. Education (secular and Islamic alike), is the base of maintaining the community, the pinnacle of which is female education. We agree we need an ummah well informed to be able to impact decisions made in our communities and countries that affect us. One bit that is still a qualm is girl child education (especially higher tertiary education).
Our ummah has become wide awake at the mishaps and humiliations our women go through because we don’t have female representatives to attend to them in areas of education, health, business, etc. Being a good thing that we have identified the problem and have identified its solution in female education, we are yet to get structures to support the process from start to finish. Alhamdulillah we make very good effort at giving them primary and secondary education, but our approach towards tertiary education is imbalanced. Most of us (men and women alike) see our daughters and sisters more as wives than as professionals.
I am a strong advocate for early marriage and I believe neither education nor career should be a barrier to a lady accepting a marriage proposal or her parent allowing her to marry. But my concern is; how secure is she that she can pursue them even after marriage? We’ve gotten to two extremes with regards to female tertiary education; either we marry her off and get her to be a good wife and mother stalling her aspirations or we reject proposals till she finishes school at the risk of either falling into haram relationships, zina or eventually marrying someone whose Islam is nothing to write home about or in some cases non-Muslims who will do shoddy reversion just so they could marry them. I see the Muslim community crying for a revolution we are not yet ready for.
There is a big notion in the minds of most Muslim men that the tertiary educated, the professional, the ambitious and/or the established Muslim woman is not a material for good wife. We find ourselves very often questioning their ability to be submissive. Inasmuch as I know, accept and acknowledge that some of the Muslim ladies in the aforementioned categories tend to act up and show a lot of attitude, I also know that, being attitudinal is a nature of women even when she’s never sat in any classroom before. Every husband will have to cope with some level of attitude. The only difference here is that, we have convinced ourselves that, they are acting the way they are because they are educated. Let’s assume the notion aforementioned is true, the solution doesn’t lie in skipping them when we are choosing wives, the solution lies in finding a way to manage the attitudes as we educate them.
A scenario I contemplate a lot on is, what if I make a judgment that she’ll be submissive because she is not in tertiary yet, and then she begins to act up after marriage; wouldn’t that be a double blow? Because then, I will be thinking she has no right to.
It is common also to hear that Muslim highly educated and career women have bizarre expectations of a man and are ‘booklong’. Though I agree that this is also true for some cases, I think the main reason why most men shy away from them is insecurity. The average Muslim man is not psyched to acknowledge competition from a woman, especially when it seems to challenge his status as the dominant figure. It is not in the psyche of the average Muslim man to have a wife who is more established than he is. That to him translates into lack of submission on the part of the wife (especially the practising Muslim man).
We keep preaching about how we find a good example in the Prophet (SAW) yet we forget he didn’t fret at marrying Khadijah (RA) who was even his employer. He didn’t allow himself to be threatened by her status. Before we are tempted to think that he was a Prophet, let’s remember that he was her employee at that time. He never even knew he was to be a Prophet one day. That was only a mission to begin fifteen years down the lane. But he had a brand image to his advantage. He was Al Ameen (the trustworthy) and that was key to a business minded person. Khadijah (RA) was a very established woman who had turned many proposals down because she wanted more than just any man.
She wanted someone who understood her aspirations and was ready to be true to her in it. That sends me back to the issue of expectations on the side of the women. Inasmuch as I agree that some are unreasonable, I will like us be frank to ourselves as men. The expectations we have of ourselves and the environment around us as educated men is very different from the expectations of the lay man. That is simply because we observe things in different lenses. A lady who has hopes of pursuing higher education and career sees things in a different light as well. She will want to marry someone who will sync with her aspirations and support it. She wants more than just any man. She wants a Superman. This does not necessarily have any bearings with her submissiveness. Sometimes we just feel insecure as men at the thought of marrying these ladies. How about we up our personal aspirations as practising Muslim men just so we match up to these expectations? What is nicer than a wife whose status alone presents a challenge to you to want to be more than you are today? Is it an issue of insecurity on the part of the Muslim man or the perceived lack of submissiveness on the part of the Muslim ambitious woman?
I will take an example in women in medicine. I remember a friend of mine mention to me in a conversation that it is not advisable to marry a woman in medicine because they have ego problem. I asked myself, who then should marry them? Should they always be married to non-practising men? We lament today about how our women are humiliated because they go all covered to the hospitals only to strip to strange men. We all admit we need Muslim women to attend to our wives and sisters, yet we shy away from marrying them because their status presents a sense of threat to our dominance as husbands.
My little findings from the medical school indicate that very few of the women there (Muslim and non-Muslim alike) venture into gynaecology. The stress, the energy and the time it takes is simply overwhelming. Yet we still know it is a need. Now, before we start giving the ‘she could have gotten married and schooled at the same time’ line, have we thought of how tough it is even for the men in medical school, not to talk of if it has to come with a blend of possible in-law issues, general marriage issues and possible pregnancy? Another line could be that ‘she could defer and continue later’. Have we given a thought to the number of years it takes to finish medical school? Have we realized that gynaecology is a specialty and needs more years after medical school? Have we given a thought to the urgency to attend to the humiliations our mothers, wives and sisters go through? Let’s say she agrees to marry and school at the same time, how secure can she feel that you share in her aspirations and that you will support her in it?
This is not to say I am in support of delayed marriage due of education or the desire to pursue a career. Far from it. My ask is, what are the structures we have in place to support our women in their education or to pursue their careers should we marry them or marry them off whilst they are in school? How much of the responsibilities can we take off from them just so they can achieve their goals and aspirations? How can we rid the Muslim man of the phobia of marrying the ambitious Muslim woman? How ready are we to accept the challenge to upgrade ourselves to matchup to the ‘bizzare’ expectations of the ambitious Muslim woman?
I know that the topic of women in profession is one of contention for most Muslim men, yet we have to appreciate that our ladies didn’t put in conscious efforts to excel in schools just for nothing. They have ambitions they will like to pursue. I have been in KNUST and it is always a thing of pride to see our Muslim ladies topping their various department lists. How about we be a source of support to them as we wish to marry them and have them mother our children for us?
I read an article entitled ‘Wifehood and Motherhood are Not the Only Ways to Paradise’ on www.virtualmosque.com by Maryam Amirebrahimi. The concern she expressed is on how some of our sisters (especially the practising ones) choose just any course to read at the universities because they are just waiting for Mr Right to come and marry them so they excel at wifehood and motherhood and how the don’t really have much aspirations aside those. We relate to our sisters dozens of narrations about women who excelled in wifehood and motherhood and gained jannah via them. We tend to either consciously or unconsciously relegate narrations from our history of women who excelled in the fields of scholarship, medicine, business, etc. and benefitted the ummah via it and were also excellent wives and mothers. Obvious examples I can give are Khadijah Bint Khuwaylid and Aisha Bint AbuBakr (may Allah be pleased with them), these women weren’t just kept in the rare as wives to the Prophet (PBUH). They benefitted the ummah. Aisha (RA) was an epitome of scholarship. Men and women alike sought knowledge from her. She is today recorded in the list of greatest hadith narrators. We also have Aisha bint Muhammad (d. 906/1500) and Habus Bint Bashir whom IOU are profiling as part of their revolutionary course AL MUMINAAT. The interesting bit is that, all these women were wives as well.
On an episode of the Standpoint on GTV were professional Muslim women sharing their stories of how they survive being Muslim women in profession, wives and mothers. One that particularly touched me was the story of Dr Zainab Baba, working at 37 Military Hospital now, specializing in gynaecology and married with children. The interesting bit was when she had to speak about her husband. The zeal with which she did it made me doff my hat for him. Then comes Dr Aisha of Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital who is also married, we also have Lawyer Ummu who is also married. I was so very impressed when I read of Sister Asmaa Bint Ayyub on the ‘Beautiful Soul’ (A ladies’ session coordinated by Rubaba Mma Hajia). The fact that she was a wife, a mother, went ahead to get her masters and pursuing a career in psychology is amazing. It was very apparent how understanding and supportive her husband is when it was time for her to speak of him. I personally know a friend whose wife is taking a masters course in KNUST. What he does is to take some leave days from work when her exam is due just so he could attend to the regular chores as she did extra studies for her papers. This is what I call support. Two women who stood out for me with regards to wife-hood
, motherhood, benefit to the ummah and ambition were Hajia Fabash and Madam Zubaida of blessed memory. They can’t seem to be forgotten huh! And it is amazing the state in which they both died. Have we sat to reflect on the status of a woman who dies during childbirth or immediately afterwards, or during the period of nifaas (postpartum bleeding). Yes, Martyrdom!
May Allah accept their souls, forgive them their sins, grant them martyrdom and grant their families sabr and eeman. Their husbands are worth celebrating for the unflinching support they gave them and for not allowing their aspirations feel like a threat to their dominance as husbands.
‘When nails grow long, we cut the nails not the fingers’. Instead of shying away from marrying these women, can we stop feeling insecure about the degrees they’ve earned, the jobs they are into, the cars they drive, the ambitions they have? Can we stop hiding the aspirations of our wives due to a false sense of modesty? Can we be proud of them and facilitate their journeys? Can we allow our women to be not just wives to us but also a benefit to the ummah; even if it is to their women folks only? I appreciate that it will not be easy but the good thing about sacrifice is that it is not meant to be easy. It is meant to be challenging.
We may think that this article is referring to just women with secular aspirations but I have been informed of someone who attempted to deny his wife permission to even venture into Islamic scholarship.
Dear Ambitious Muslimah
There is a saying that “There is no smoke without fire”. Muslim men wouldn’t have come to these conclusion if they haven’t seen or received attitudes from some of you. A lot has been said about the men and just as we will be looking up to the example of the Prophet (PBUH), a perfect example lies for you in Khadijah (RA). Khadijah was a woman I call classic. Beautiful, smart, rich; she had values and was the want of many men. She was a hot cake. Yet she didn’t allow all those stop her from seeing a husband in her humble employee. She didn’t go smearing it in the face of the Prophet what her status was or talking back at him. She was to him a wife, a mother to six of his children. In her the Prophet found love, he found companionship, he found solace, he found a confidant. In her he found a pillar, he found the woman who believed him when no one else did. It didn’t matter to her what his status was. It was just enough for her that he was trustworthy. Think about it, if she had allowed her ego to blind her, she would have never been a mother of the believers fifteen years later. She could have married someone who matched her calibre yet she would have lost more (something we see a lot today).
That young man you are feeling too big to accept or feel cannot manage you may be a nobody today, but you do not know what the future has for him. You do not know what you may be missing simply because you choose to be egoistic and self-conceited. The fact that you are a first degree, a masters or a PhD holder doesn’t mean you should definitely marry someone with a car and a mansion. The fact that you are a doctor doesn’t mean you should marry a manager. The fact that you are a lawyer doesn’t mean you should marry a judge. Be humble enough to marry someone whose religion and manners please you. It should be enough that he appreciates your ambitions and is ready to support it. You never know what his tomorrow looks like.
Regardless of your social status, what a man will want from you is for you to be a wife to him, for you to be there for him, for you to satisfy his physical and emotional needs, for you to be a mother to his children and for you respect and be submissive to him. These are non-negotiable. They are the basic needs of every man and that included the Prophet (PBUH). Don’t live in the deceit of so called feminists. They are only leaving the frustration of being single. Let them get someone to eventually marry and you will realize how their thought process will change
Ari-J Ibrahim Taagba
First published on February 18, 2016.
Post a Comment