How do female students of knowledge connect with the scholars and study the Book and the Sunnah?

The questioner : Okay, this is the same question, yes, the seventh question, for the same seventh question, yes. Okay, we, as female students of knowledge and women, I mean, women, specifically, unlike men, because men are able to go out to the scholars and connect with them, but we find great difficulty in connecting with the scholars or in going out of the house continuously. We are confused when we want to study a certain issue; we are confused about the books or the references or the scholars. For example, we have Shaykh 'Abd al-'Aziz ibn Baz or Shaykh Ibn Uthaymeen, and we find it difficult to contact them. So what is your opinion, O Shaykh? Do you advise us, as female students of knowledge or female university students, to study the Book and the Sunnah, the Shari'ah based on the Book and the Sunnah, and not based on a specific school of jurisprudence?

The Shaykh : What is the reason, may Allah bless you? I think the answer to this statement is contained in the details of my last answer, but it appears that the matter needs some clarification and explanation. First, as a general rule, fear Allah as much as you are able. You are saying now that we are not able to connect with the scholars. It is not necessary that you connect with the scholar personally. The important thing is that you hear his voice and understand his words, even if it is from behind a barrier.
And today, Allah the Exalted has created these means, including the telephone, so you are able to connect with the scholars no matter how far away they are from you. This is a means that we must not overlook, and we must not take it as an excuse, we women, saying, "By Allah, we are not able to connect with the scholars as men do." Allah has created a means for men and women that facilitates for any one of them to connect with any scholar she wishes, at least in cases of necessity. This is one point.
I said just now that it is not necessary for the one who follows a school of jurisprudence, who does not find the scholars as you say, who are discerning in the Book and the Sunnah, to stick to that. I mentioned two examples of this: the Honorable Shaykh Ibn Baz and Ibn Uthaymeen. If it is not facilitated for men to have these two noble scholars, and likewise for women, that does not mean that we should study only some of the books of the schools of jurisprudence and turn away from studying the books of some scholars who were followers of schools of jurisprudence, but then this reality became clear to them: the obligation to follow the Book and the Sunnah. So we must study, along with our study of a specific school from these followed schools, the books of those whom we can call the followers or the independents, who do not follow a specific imam. These people clarify many of the issues in which the scholars differed, and they discuss these issues with their evidence from the Book and the Sunnah. At that time, a student of knowledge who follows the method of adhering to one of the four schools of jurisprudence can, by reading such books as we have mentioned, have some discernment in the religion and not be a blind follower of the school he studied to one hundred percent. So such books, for example, are *Sabil al-Salam* by al-San'ani, and *Al-Awa'it* by al-Shawkani, and *Al-Sayd al-Jarar* also by al-Shawkani, and *Al-Rawdat al-Nadiyyah Sharh al-Durar al-Bahiyyah* by al-Siddiq Hasan Khan, and similar books. This is the way for male and female students: to study knowledge from the paths of books that study a specific school of jurisprudence and the other books whose authors are independent from following a school of jurisprudence, because at that time, as is said, things become clear by their opposites. Yes. We study the schools of jurisprudence because some of the sisters... yes, yes. No, no, I do not say that initially we study the schools of jurisprudence; this requires extensive study. But initially, if the Muslim is not in an academic environment...