Shaking hands with an elderly woman by relatives who are not mahram
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success. He says: My grandmother is eighty years old, and she has relatives, but they are not among her mahram. When greeting them, she shakes their hands. Is this action permissible?
Answer:
No, a woman who is not a mahram to a man does not shake hands with him, whether she is old or young. This is because the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) never touched the hand of a woman who was not lawful for him, not even once. Even in the pledge of allegiance, he pledged with the women by speech and did not shake their hands. Among them were the elderly women, meaning all those who pledged with him were young women. There were elderly women, yes.
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success. He says: My grandmother is eighty years old, and she has relatives, but they are not among her mahram. When greeting them, she shakes their hands. Is this action permissible?
Answer:
No, a woman who is not a mahram to a man does not shake hands with him, whether she is old or young. This is because the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) never touched the hand of a woman who was not lawful for him, not even once. Even in the pledge of allegiance, he pledged with the women by speech and did not shake their hands. Among them were the elderly women, meaning all those who pledged with him were young women. There were elderly women, yes.
Source
شرح كتاب المنتقى من أخبار المصطفى صلى الله عليه وسلم، بداية من باب نهي المرأة أن تلبس ما يحكي بدنها أو تشبه بالرجال — islamhouse.com (44:54)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.