To answer your points and the other commentators below, I want to point out again that the interpretation of this hadith has been that a woman should not ask for domestic help, yet that is not the point of this hadith at all. A woman or man should not ask to “enslave” someone in order to get free help. We can see from the tone of this narration that Ali is concerned for the wellbeing of his wife Fatima, so if Ali could “afford” to hire a servant to help Fatima, I am sure he would have done so and Fatima would not have needed to go to her father to ask for a prisoner of war.

Many hadiths indicate that Ali barely had enough money to pay for food for the family, so it shows that they did not have the financial means to hire help. Giving employment to someone with fair pay is the Islamic thing to do and the Prophet would welcome that since someone else would be able to feed their family by being paid for their work. The Prophet said it is better to chop up wood and sell it than to beg for money, so working to earn a living is much encouraged in Islam.

Why then would the Prophet come in the middle of the night to discourage his favorite daughter to help another family by giving them employment? The Prophet did not want Fatima and Ali to own a slave because if they owned a slave, then how would the Prophet fairly tell his other Sahaba to free their slaves?

The decision to hire a domestic helper is a decision between a husband and wife. It is neither about a right of a wife or an obligation of a husband. This hadith says nothing about this matter at all.

This discussion is not to bring up controversy, but to better explain the beautiful deen of Islam. I can’t believe someone would dismiss the relevancy of this important matter such as discouraging slavery saying that this hadith is just about dhikr. Remembrance of Allah does not just mean one should say Subhana Allah 33 times. It is about remembering how Just and Fair Allah is, and that He wants us to reflect on His words and study them rather than take someone elses words or interpretations blindly. The Prophet said that one hour of reflection on the Quran is better than a whole night of blind prayer and that a scholar’s pen is mightier than the sword. Yet, when it comes to bringing an interpretation other than the common interpretation, we are told to stop making controversies????? How is that following the Sunnah of the Prophet or the Quran?

As regards to verses 4:34, one only needs to read the Arabic to understand that no where does it say “Men are favored over women”. The literal translation is that Allah ” has favored some over others”. Men are favored over women in some aspects, but the fact that men are bound to support and guard women actually favors women. This favor goes both ways (subhana Allah), meaning in this statement that men are Qawamuun over women, He has favored both men and women. The men are given an important responsibility, and women are given a great relief as they focus on raising their children. For example when one hires a tax accountant, the tax accountant gets business and the person gets relief in doing their taxes. That does not make the tax accountant superior to the person who hired him, nor does the person who hired the tax accountant become superior. It’s a mutually beneficial relationship. This is also true about men and women. There are other expert Quran scholars who have supported this interpretation, but remember other scholars are just thinking human beings who reflected on the Quran. They are not a Prophet, and so as another thinking human being, I am also able to offer my own understanding of these verses without the need to always back up the interpretation by a male scholar. Allah commanded all of us to think and reflect. Who is to say everything a scholar of the past wrote is an indisputable fact? On the most part they are right, but can we say they can never get anything wrong? I don’t think so. You read the Quran verses yourself and tell me that my interpretation is in anyway unreasonable, wrong or contrary to any other verses of the Quran that show that the relationship between a man and woman is equally beneficial. I rather discuss what the Quran says, not what scholars say, as the Quran is the divine text, not scholars writings.

I also differ with the statement that all women love to do household work, organizing and decorating. Some do, most don’t. It is something that is conveniently left for women to do as they are home raising their children, but I prefer to go and earn a living of my own over doing dishes and laundry and listening to a crying baby any day.

Also doing dhikr applies not to just housework but any type of halal work by both men and women. The Prophet said the one whose tongue is always moist with the dhikr of Allah will earn paradise. So the Prophet is pointing Fatima and Ali to seek Allah’s help in hardship, and do not cause hardship on others by enslaving them, hence the meaning of the statement “shall I give you something that is better than what you ask for”.

Interesting…how some people are focusing on some fiqh and debated issues while the main objective of this article seemed to be bringing us back to the remembrance of Allah and how it has the power to refuel us despite the drudgery of a day’s work.

Unfortunately that has become the theme of most of the recent MM posts. We couldn’t just stop at “Remembrance of Allah” but we had to add the last part to stir up some sort of controversy/debate/argument.

No one would care for just a beneficial reminder and wouldn’t get as many hits and replies.

Allahu Alam

Assalamualykum.

SubhanAllah, I am sitting here exhausted after cooking and cleaning for hours while trying to study for my final exam, and I came online to read/decompress a bit before I went to bed. Truly, this is exactly the reminder I needed.
Sometimes I wonder where other women get all their energy from and I think you may have tapped into the secret. InshaAllah, this will work for me as well!