To My Female Preacher Sister

The successful female preacher is the one who nurtures her sisters to understand the call, master it, develop the capability to educate others through it, and persevere in it. Any failure in even one of these three elements constitutes a disaster for Islamic work.

She must understand the mindset of the person she is addressing, and shape her discourse and preaching accordingly. Among them are the originally Muslim woman who has been misled by infidel thought; the authentic infidel woman; the oblivious Muslim woman; the Sufi Muslim woman; the woman devoted to worldly life; the woman aspiring to the Hereafter; the one who engages in individual preaching; and the one whose sole concern is the minutiae and branches of Islam.

There is also the one who preaches only the core principles of Islam; the one who recognizes no Islam other than adhering to strict resolutions; and another who advocates for concessions.

The female preacher must know how to begin her outreach with each of these individuals and master the initial approach in addressing them.

Domestic Workers Are a Trust

She must not overlook domestic workers in the household, and she should strive to raise them on Islamic values and morals due to their close contact and impact on the children. She instills in them trustworthiness, compassion, diligence, patience, and chastity, recognizing that they are human beings who influence and are influenced. She warns against neglecting them or falling short of their rights, emphasizing that a mother and wife must fulfill her role at home rather than shifting it entirely onto the domestic workers.

Islamic Values in Domestic Life

Furthermore, she urges her sisters to preserve Islamic etiquette across all aspects of domestic life. The ideal wife is the one whose attributes are described in the Qur'an, chosen by Allah for His Prophet (pbuh), as He stated: {It may be that if he divorces you, his Lord will replace you with wives better than you: submitting, believing, devout, repentant, worshipping, traveling [or fasting].} [At-Tahrim 66:5]. Islam, faith, obedience, repentance, worship, and fasting are the defining traits of the Muslim wife and sister.

She trains her sisters in righteousness, for no Muslim woman can truly attain obedience unless she is righteous. She acknowledges the guardianship of men over women and does not dispense with it, as Allah stated: {Men are the protectors and maintainers of women, because Allah has made one of them excel over the other, and because they spend out of their wealth. Therefore, the righteous women are devoutly obedient, guarding in [the husband's] absence what Allah orders them to guard.} [An-Nisa 4:34]. {The world is provisional, and the best provision of this world is a righteous woman.}

The Muslim household must have members who adhere to Islamic attire. This includes a woman's right to wear garments that are loose, neither revealing nor transparent, far from ostentation and adornment, and to raise her daughters accordingly, with the mother acting as a role model. No forbidden item should enter her home, nothing forbidden should be hung on its walls, and the interior of the house must not be exposed to outsiders.

Raising Children and Fulfilling Family Duties

She prepares her children during the pre-puberty stage with everything necessary to fulfill Allah’s rights upon reaching puberty, taking them by the hand after puberty along the path of guidance. She steers them away from everything un-Islamic in beliefs, acts of worship, transactions, and all matters of their lives, while offering sincere advice and reminders to every relative connected to her, calling them to the right path.

These guidelines were derived from the writings of leaders in the Islamic call. I ask Allah to reward them abundantly.

— Ahmed Al-Qattan

Published in Issue No. 944, Tuesday, December 5, 1989.