SAFEGUARDING THE ECONOMIC INTERESTS OF WOMAN
Islam, in an unprecedented manner, has safeguarded the economic and financial interests of woman. On the one hand it has given her economic independence, and restrained man from misappropriating her money or having any control over her property, and on the other it has taken off from her shoulders any responsibility to meet family expenses. Thus she is not in need of running after money.
The Westerners, who want to criticise the law of maintenance, find no alternative but to resort to a big lie. They say that the philosophy of maintenance is that man considers himself to be the master of woman and engages her to work for him. As the owner of an animal he has to bear its expenses, so that the animal may continue to serve him, in the same way and with the same purpose the law of maintenance has made it obligatory on man to provide, at least, some bread and butter to his wife.
In fact, if one wants to attack this Islamic law, one may find it rather easier to criticise it in the most eloquent terms, for having shown more favour to woman and for burdening man with more responsibility, than criticising it in the name of supporting the cause of woman.
The truth is that Islam has intended neither to favour man nor to favour woman. Islam is not partial to either of them. It has not only aimed at the welfare of both man and woman, but also of their prospective children and the entire humanity. Islam believes that the only way how man, woman, their children and humanity can attain prosperity is not to ignore the natural laws and commands of the Almighty Creator.
As we have repeatedly pointed out, Islam has always kept this fact in view that man is a symbol of need, desire and pursuit and woman is a symbol of indifference. Islam portrays man as the customer and woman as the owner of goods. From the Islamic point of view, man should consider himself to be a beneficiary and should be prepared to bear her necessary expenditure. Man and woman should not forget that, in the matter of love, they have been allotted two different roles by nature. Marriage can be stable and enjoyable only when they play their respective natural roles properly.
Another reason why the husband has been made responsible for maintaining his wife is that it is she who suffers all the pains in connection with child-bearing. Man's natural role in this respect is only momentary and pleasure-giving. It is the woman who has to bear all the troubles connected with pregnancy, delivery, suckling and nursing the child.
All these functions consume her energy and reduce her working capacity. If it is decided that the law will give no protection to woman and will put both man and woman on an equal footing with regard to contributing to the family budget, the position of woman would no doubt become unenviable. As we know, among those animals also which live in pairs, the male always protects the female and helps her during breeding in securing food.
Furthermore, from the viewpoint of the working capacity and the ability to perform hard and rough and productive and economic jobs, man and woman are not equal. If relations between them are estranged and man refuses to spend anything on her out of his income, woman would hardly be able to compete with him.
In addition to all this, woman needs more money than man. Self-beautification and self-decoration are a part of woman's life, and one of her main necessities. What a woman spends in her ordinary life on self- beautification is several times more than what a man spends on such items. Her tendency to beautification has created in her a longing for variety and diversity. To a man a suit of clothes is usable as long as it is not worn out, but a woman wears a dress only as long as it gives a new look. Often a dress or an ornament loses its value after being worn only once. Woman's earning capacity is less than that of man, but her consumption of wealth is far greater.
Woman's womanhood, that is her beauty, vivacity and pride, demand more comfort and less effort. If the circumstances force her to work hard and make constant efforts to earn money, her vanity is shattered. The financial worries will produce the same kind of wrinkles on her face, as they produce on the face and forehead of a man. It is often heard that those poor Western women, who have to work in factories and workshops to earn their livelihood, wish that they could lead the life of an Eastern woman. Obviously, a woman who is not mentally satisfied can neither look after herself properly nor can she be a source of delight to her husband.
Therefore, it is not only in the interest of woman, but also in the interest of man and the family atmosphere, that woman should not be forced to shoulder the crushing burden of earning her livelihood. Man also wants that the atmosphere at home should be such that he may feel relaxed and may forget all his worries. Such an atmosphere can be provided by woman only, if she herself is not tired and worried. What a pity if man comes home tired and exhausted and meets a wife who is more tired and more exhausted than he himself'.
Hence woman's relaxation, vivacity and satisfaction are of the utmost importance to man also.
The reason why men are prepared to put their hard-earned money willingly at the disposal of their wives and to allow them to spend it liberally on their own comforts is that they realise that they need wives for their own mental peace. They realise that Allah has made woman a source of comfort and relaxation to man. The Qur'an says: "From that He made his mate so that he may find comfort in her". (Surah A'raf, 7:189). Man realises that, whatever he spends to satisfy his wife, he spends indirectly to ensure his own satisfaction and happiness and to brighten his family life. He knows that to be able to provide comfort to each other, at least one of the two spouses must not be overcome with exhaustion and, in this division of labour, it is man who is more suited to take part in the struggle of life and woman is more suited to play the role of a comforter.
Man and woman have been so created that from the financial and material point of view woman has to depend on man, and from the spiritual and moral point of view man has to depend on woman. Woman cannot satisfy her material needs without the support of man, and that is why Islam has enjoined upon her legal husband (only the legal husband) to support his wife.
If woman wants to live as magnificently as she desires, she must get the support of her legal husband. Otherwise, she will have to depend upon other men, the instances of which are very common, and which, unfortunately, are on the increase.
PROPAGANDA AGAINST MAINTENANCE
The s*x perverts have discovered that, if a woman's plentiful financial needs are not satisfied by her husband, she can easily be entrapped by them. That is one of the reasons why there is so much propaganda against the maintenance of the wife by the husband. If you probe the philosophy of the fat salaries paid by commercial organisations to their female employees, you may easily grasp what we mean.
There can be no doubt that abolition of the system of maintenance will lead a woman to prostitution. How can it be possible for a woman, who leads a life independent of man, to administer her natural demands by herself?
The idea of the abolition of this system finds support from those men also who are fed up with the extravagance of their wives. They want to wreak their vengeance upon the extravagant and fashionable women in general through the woman themselves and give it the name of liberty and equality.
Will Durant, after defining 'neo-marriage' as ' a kind of legal marriage with legal contraception, dependence of the right of divorce on the consent of both the parties, and there being no children and no maintenance', says: "The fashionable women of the middle class will soon cause the vengeance of the hard-working man to be wreaked upon the entire female s*x. Marriage will undergo such a change that the idle women, who are simply expensive pieces of decoration, will no longer exist. Men will ask women to bear their own expenses. The friendly marriage or neo-marriage requires woman to work till the advanced stage of pregnancy. From now onward she will have to bear all her expenses and thus her liberation will become complete. The industrial revolution is giving manifestation of its cruel consequences. Woman has to work in a factory along with her husband. Woman, instead of sitting idle in a secluded room and compelling her husband to work twice as much to compensate for her unproductiveness, has to be equal to him in work, retribution, rights and obligations.
Will Durant then sarcastically adds: "That is the meaning of woman's liberation".
STATE INSTEAD OF HUSBAND
It is an undeniable fact that child-bearing is the natural function of woman and as such she has to depend upon man for her economic and financial support.
Some people in modern Europe, in their advocacy of woman's liberation, have gone to the extent of supporting the restoration of the matriarchal system. They believe that, with the complete independence of woman and her equality with man in all affairs, in future the father will be regarded as an unnecessary appendage and will eventually be excluded from the family.
At the same time, these people call on the government to take the place of the father and give a subsidy to the women who are unwilling to shoulder the responsibility of forming a family alone, so that they may not stop bearing children and the human race may not come to an end. In other words, woman, who, so far, was a dependent and, according to some critics, a bondsmaid of man, will in future become a dependent and bondsmaid of the government. The duties and rights of father will be transferred to government.
One can wish that these people, who are bent upon blindly pulling down the sacred family structure founded on celestial laws, had given some thought to the consequences of their action.
Bertrand Russell in his book, 'Marriage and Morals', discusses the question of the government's cultural and hygienic intervention in connection with children. He says: "Apparently the father is losing his importance as a biological cause. Another powerful factor which is effective in dislodging him from his pedestal is women's tendency towards economic independence. The women who take part in voting are mostly unmarried. The married women have more problems than the maidens. In spite of legal safeguards they lag behind in securing jobs. If the married women want to maintain their economic independence, they have two alternatives: either they stick to their jobs and leave the nursing of their children to paid nurses, or receive a subsidy paid to them by the government to enable them to look after their children themselves. In the former case, the number of creches and nurseries will greatly increase, and, from the psychological point of view, the natural consequence of the situation will be that for the children neither a father nor a mother will exist.
The second alternative alone will not do. It has to be supplemented by a legal provision of compulsory re-employment of the mothers, when their children reach a particular age. This method has one advantage. Woman can bring up her children herself without having to depend on her male partner for this purpose In case such a law is actually passed, we shall have to wait to see its repercussion on family morals. It is possible that the law decides that an illegitimate child has no right to subsidy or that in case there are indications that the mother has committed adultery, the subsidy is given to the father. In this case the local police may have to keep a watch on married women. The results of such a law will not be very pleasant and may be embarrassing to those responsible for bringing about this moral development.
Consequently, it may be expected 'that the idea of police interference will have to be dropped and the subsidy will be extended to the mothers of illegitimate children also. In this case, the economic role of the father will totally disappear among the working classes, and his importance for his children will be no more than that of a dog or a cat . . . Civilisation, or the civilisation which has so far developed, tends towards weakening the motherly feelings.
To safeguard this civilisation, which has already developed so much, it may be found necessary to give women enough money to find pregnancy definitely profitable. In this case, it will not be necessary that all women or most of them choose maternity. It will be a profession like any other profession and will be selected by women in earnest. But all these are presumptions. What we mean is that the women's liberation movement is causing the downfall of patriarchy which, from pre-historic days, represented man's victory over woman. In the West it is believed to be a sign of the progress of civilisation that the government is taking the place of the father
As is clear from the above observations, the abolition of woman's maintenance or, as these gentlemen like to describe it, woman's economic independence, will have the following effects:
The father will be excluded from the family or at least will lose his importance. The matriarchal system will be revived. The government will take the place of the father. Mothers will be supported by the government. Motherly feelings will become weak. Maternity will lose its sentimental form and will be turned into a profession.
Obviously, the result of all these developments will be a complete collapse of the family which will mean a downfall of humanity. In such circumstances everything else will be all right, but one thing will be lacking and that is the happiness and enjoyment of mental peace and pleasure, peculiar to family life.
Anyhow, what we mean is that even the supporters of complete independence and freedom of woman and the exclusion of the father from the family circle hold that woman's natural function of child-bearing entitles her to a subsidy and in some cases even hire-charges or wages which, according to them, should be paid by the government. On the other hand, the natural function of man does not give him any such right.
The labour laws of the world, while fixing the minimum wages of a male worker, take into consideration the requirements of his wife and children also, which means that the world labour laws officially recognise that man is responsible to maintain his wife and children.
HAS THE UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS HUMILIATED WOMAN?
The Declaration of Human Rights (article 23, clause iii) says: "Everyone, who works, has the right to a just and favourable remuneration, ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection
Clause (i) of article 25 says: "Everyone has the right to a standard of living, adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other means being not available for livelihood, in circumstances beyond his control".
These two articles imply that every man, who forms a family, has to bear the expenses of his wife and children and that their expenses are considered to be a part of his own expenses.
Though the Declaration of Human Rights specifically states that man and woman have equal rights, it does not regard woman 5 maintenance by man as derogatory to this equality. Hence, those who always quote this Declaration as an authority should regard the question of woman's maintenance by her husband as finally settled and a fait accompli. Will those Westernised people, who call everything Islamic reactionary, allow themselves to outrage even the sanctity of this Declaration, and to describe it as a vestige of woman's slavery?
Furthermore, when the Declaration of Human Rights says that everyone has the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or lack of means of livelihood in circumstances beyond his or her control it not only describes widowhood as a blow to livelihood but also mentions it as parallel with unemployment, sickness and disability. Thus it puts the women in the category of the unemployed, the sick, the disabled and the superannuated. Is this not a big insult to woman? Had such an expression been found in a book or a legal code of an Eastern country, certainly a great hue and cry would have been raised by now.
But those, who are realistic enough not to be influenced by false propaganda and look at things squarely, know well that neither the law of creation, which has made man a means of livelihood for woman, is derogatory to her, nor is the Declaration of Human Rights, which has put widowhood in the category of unemployment, disparaging. Similarly, the Islamic law, which has made woman's maintenance obligatory on man, has in no way made her inferior. It is a fact that she has been created in such a way that she needs man and is dependent on him.
Man and woman have been created interdependent with a view to making the union between them stronger and domestic relations, on which human happiness depends, firmer. If woman depends on man financially, man also depends on her for his mental peace. This interdependence brings them closer and unites them better.
