What is the ruling on a woman driving a car?
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner : The questioner asks: What is the ruling on a woman driving a car, out of necessity or without necessity?
The Shaykh : This issue was discussed by our Shaykh, 'Abd al-'Aziz ibn 'Abd Allah ibn Baz, who clarified that raising this issue is generally not done with good intentions. Those who raise such matters—had I known this question would be asked, and I hope you do not ask questions without proper preparation, had I known it would be read, but in any case, since it has been read, I say to you, my brothers: most of those who raise such matters, and Allah knows their intentions best, only want to create confusion among the people. They want to expose women, not to protect them, but to throw them out and expose them until they fall into the clutches of Satan. This issue is not applicable at all right now. The young men need to be disciplined in driving cars, so what do you think if a woman were to drive a car?
Furthermore, there are many young men who can be relied upon to drive instead of women. If a necessity were to arise, it is not possible to establish a general ruling stating that it is permissible out of necessity and below that. Rather, we say that it is undoubtedly wise, and required by the evidence of the Shari'ah, to prevent women from driving cars, because of the harms that result from it. Some writers who responded to our Shaykh 'Abd al-'Aziz said that basing rulings on harms and the like is not convincing. We say to him: you are ignorant of the sources and origins of the Shari'ah. Otherwise, the entire Shari'ah came to secure benefits and remove harms. It is all built on this principle and the great rule of repelling harms and attracting benefits. If the harms mentioned regarding women driving are not considered harms by you, then they are harms in the view of those who are sincere, have faith, knowledge, and understanding of the development and change of affairs. The Shari'ah requires preventing what these harms necessitate. In any case, raising this issue and its dismissal by those who raised it
The Shaykh : This issue was discussed by our Shaykh, 'Abd al-'Aziz ibn 'Abd Allah ibn Baz, who clarified that raising this issue is generally not done with good intentions. Those who raise such matters—had I known this question would be asked, and I hope you do not ask questions without proper preparation, had I known it would be read, but in any case, since it has been read, I say to you, my brothers: most of those who raise such matters, and Allah knows their intentions best, only want to create confusion among the people. They want to expose women, not to protect them, but to throw them out and expose them until they fall into the clutches of Satan. This issue is not applicable at all right now. The young men need to be disciplined in driving cars, so what do you think if a woman were to drive a car?
Furthermore, there are many young men who can be relied upon to drive instead of women. If a necessity were to arise, it is not possible to establish a general ruling stating that it is permissible out of necessity and below that. Rather, we say that it is undoubtedly wise, and required by the evidence of the Shari'ah, to prevent women from driving cars, because of the harms that result from it. Some writers who responded to our Shaykh 'Abd al-'Aziz said that basing rulings on harms and the like is not convincing. We say to him: you are ignorant of the sources and origins of the Shari'ah. Otherwise, the entire Shari'ah came to secure benefits and remove harms. It is all built on this principle and the great rule of repelling harms and attracting benefits. If the harms mentioned regarding women driving are not considered harms by you, then they are harms in the view of those who are sincere, have faith, knowledge, and understanding of the development and change of affairs. The Shari'ah requires preventing what these harms necessitate. In any case, raising this issue and its dismissal by those who raised it
Source
دروس وفتاوى المسجد الحرام لعام 1402هـ - 8 — binothaimeen.net (1:23:16)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.