The Explanation of the Muslim Woman's 'Awrah (Part of the Body That Must Be Covered) and Her Adornment

The questioner : ...the pleasant evenings in which Allah (Glorified and Exalted is He) has granted us success to be listeners, and we ask Allah (Mighty and Majestic) to grant us success to be doers as well, for as you know, knowledge without action has no fruit. Therefore, we ask Allah (Mighty and Majestic) to grant us success to act upon what we hear.
In this evening as well, we listen to a fine word from the honorableThe Shaykh : Muhammad Nasir al-Din al-Albani, and then, as is customary, we listen to the questions of the brothers and the answersThe Shaykh : to them, so please proceed.The Shaykh .

The Shaykh : Praise is to Allah; we praise Him, seek His help, and seek His forgiveness. We seek refuge in Allah from the evil of our own souls and from the evil of our deeds. Whoever Allah guides, none can misguide, and whoever He misguides, none can guide. And I bear witness that there is no god but Allah alone, with no partner, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His slave and His Messenger. , , . As for what follows:
It occurred to me to remind our brothers present in this blessed session—if Allah wills—and those to whom my words reach, of a matter I think many Muslims are heedless of. It is not hidden from anyone that reminding people of what they are heedless of and ignorant of is more appropriate than filling their ears with matters they have long heard from preachers, teachers, exhorters, and radio broadcasts, and the like of the means that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) has facilitated in this present age. And since it was said by him (peace and blessings be upon him): ; there is no doubt that we take from this that the benefit to people is achieved by teaching them what they are ignorant of, or by reminding them of what they are heedless of.
Of this nature is knowing what the 'awrah (part of the body that must be covered) of the Muslim woman is in relation to the Muslim woman. It is mentioned in some fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence) books that the 'awrah of a woman in front of a Muslim woman is like the 'awrah of a man in front of a man, that is: from the navel to the knee. The meaning of this is that it is permissible for a Muslim woman to appear before her Muslim sister with the upper part of her body, the upper half of her body, naked and uncovered, as well as what is below her knees. What I want to remind you of is that we must know, above all, that this ruling has no evidence in the Book of Allah, nor in the hadith of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him). Another thing is that the Book of Allah indicates the opposite of this expansion in defining the 'awrah of a woman in relation to her Muslim sister. The scholars of tafsir (Qur'anic exegesis) mention that there are, for the woman, two types of adornment: apparent adornment and hidden adornment. They derived this from two noble verses:
The first verse is the saying of our Lord (Blessed and Exalted is He): , to non-mahram men, . So the apparent adornment has a relation to non-mahram men. And the apparent adornment, as established in more than one hadith traced to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), is only the face and the two hands for the woman. What is other than that is the hidden adornment, which she is not permitted to show any part of to those who are strangers to her. As for the hidden adornment; it is what Allah (Mighty and Majestic) permitted her to show to all her mahrams (relatives one may not marry) and to Muslim women in the well-known verse when our Lord (Mighty and Majestic) said: . And thus our Lord (Mighty and Majestic) lists the rest of the mahrams, until He says: . So His saying (Blessed and Exalted is He): contains a clear indication that it is permissible for the Muslim woman to show of her hidden adornment what she shows to her father, her brother, her sister, and other mahrams. So likewise, the 'awrah of a woman in relation to a Muslim woman is limited by this hidden adornment. And for us to understand what the hidden adornment is, we must return to what the women were upon in the jahiliyyah (the pre-Islamic age of ignorance), and before their entry into Islam. And when they believed in Allah and His Messenger and adopted Islam as a religion; these rulings came to clarify to these women what is permissible for them in relation to strangers, which is only the face and the two hands; that is the apparent adornment. And what is permissible for them in relation to mahrams, which is the hidden adornment. So what is the hidden adornment?
Here we must pause a little at the scholars' interpretation of the saying of Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He): the verse. What is intended by this word ? Is the intention the adornment itself, or the place of the adornment? That is: does the verse mean they do not show the places of adornment even if there is nothing of the adornment on them, or is the intention that they do not show those places while the adornment is on them? There are two opinions among the scholars, and there is no doubt that the correct opinion, which the scholars of tafsir relied upon, is that the meaning is they do not show the places of adornment, and the intention is not that they do not show the adornment. That is because if a woman takes a necklace to put on her chest and it is in her hand; she has shown the adornment; is this what she was forbidden from? The answer is no; rather, she was forbidden from showing the adornment while it is in its place.
So the intention of the verse is: the places of adornment, except for these mahrams, and then for Muslim women as we mentioned. The meaning of this is that we keep in our minds that there are places where it was not the custom of women, up to this hour, to place adornment. For example, is there adornment on the thigh? The answer is no. Is there adornment on the back? The answer is no. Is there adornment on the breasts? The answer is no. Is there adornment under the armpit? And count whatever you wish, all the answers are no, no. So our Lord (Mighty and Majestic) in this verse only permitted women to show to mahrams the places of adornment from their bodies, and nothing else, the places of adornment from their bodies, and never more than that. And to be certain of this meaning, we must keep in mind the saying of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him): , meaning he looks at her and inspires in her what inspires her infatuation, like if a person said to another, "Welcome, how beautiful you are! How good you are! How lovely you are!" and so on. . So this woman, who is entirely 'awrah except for what the Shari'ah (Islamic sacred law) has exempted, we have known from the apparent adornment that the Shari'ah, most of what it exempted regarding her apparent adornment in front of strangers, is only the face and the two hands. And regarding mahrams, it exempted the places of adornment; so what are the places of adornment that were in the time of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him)?
That is limited to known places. First of these, for example, are bracelets on the wrist. Second is the armlet that was placed on the upper arm, on the woman's upper arm. Third is the necklace, a chain placed on the neck and a part of the chest. Finally, the anklet, which our Lord (Mighty and Majestic) referred to and clarified that it is of the hidden adornment when He said: . So the woman who deviates, even slightly, from the Shari'ah hijab (the covering prescribed for women) and the Islamic etiquettes that the Muslim woman must adorn herself with and conduct herself with; she strikes with her feet so that men hear the sound of the bells that were placed on the anklet, so that it has a jingle. This jingle draws the attention of men to her. This is what some women used to do, especially in the early days of Islam when they were new to it. So Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) disciplined them with this verse and said: .
So this is the last known adornment in the early time of Islam. If we know from the previous verse that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) permitted women to show the places of adornment, and we have known these places; it becomes clear to us what are the places that it is permissible for a woman to show in front of her father, her brother, her brother's son, and finally in front of Muslim women.
So we have the hand and the forearm, and up to near the upper arm where the armlet was. Then we have the head, where there is some adornment on the ears and the neck as we mentioned. Then the foot and a part of the lower leg where the anklet is. These are the places that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) permitted the woman to uncover in front of her mahrams, and also in front of her Muslim sister.
So how do Muslims live in their homes today? They live in a state of nakedness that is most like the nakedness of women who do not know the religion of Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He). I do not know the extent of this nakedness in homes, for I am new to this country. But in Syria and Egypt, tell no more about the people’s expansion of exposure in their homes. Women expose much of their bodies beyond what Allah has permitted them to show, which is only the places of adornment. For example, we have been afflicted with short clothing that has no sleeves—undergarments—which in the old Arabic language is called *tubban* and is known today as a short. The short pant that reveals the thighs. So women today, the mother and the daughter, wear this short clothing. The daughter sits before her mother, and even before her young brother who is full of manhood and desire. She raises her leg and places it on her thigh, so her thigh appears exposed and naked. On what pretext? On the pretext that there is no stranger present; this is her brother! This contradicts the previous verse, for as we mentioned, Allah only permitted the exposure of the places of adornment. The thighs were never places of adornment, and perhaps they never will be. Likewise, a woman goes out before her brother, let alone before her father, with her upper arms exposed. This contradicts the previous text . Here, the upper arm is not adornment, and the armpit is not adornment. So all of this remains forbidden within the limits of the statement of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): . And more than that happens: a mother enters the bathroom—the home bathroom—and orders her daughter to massage her back. She exposes her back and her breasts—the upper part of the body, as we said—and there is absolutely no harm in it. Where did this come from? While the verse is explicit that our Lord (Mighty and Majestic) only permitted the woman to expose only the places of adornment. The chest is not a place of adornment, and the back is not a place of adornment. Therefore, our righteous predecessors (may Allah be pleased with them) lived in their homes within the limits of the covering that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) granted them as a dispensation. There was not this nakedness that has become widespread today in Islamic countries.
So I want to remind you of this explicit concept in the Qur'an, and that we conduct ourselves with the etiquette of the Qur'an, and that we teach our women and daughters this etiquette. And we should not be influenced by the surrounding atmosphere, for these atmospheres mostly reflect the traditions of disbelieving Europe. So we must stand by this verse . Then He (the Exalted) said: . The women here are the women of the Muslims. So here is another etiquette that we must be aware of. This occurs in this country which Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) has blessed with abundant wealth. I have seen this affliction where we do not see it in other poor countries. It is the Muslims’ excessive use of disbelieving women, let alone men, as servants in their homes. So the disbelieving female servant enters the room of the Muslim woman, and she is as if she is standing before her husband. This is not permissible. It is obligatory for the Muslim woman to veil herself before the disbelieving woman as if this woman were a Muslim man, let alone a disbeliever. So it is not permissible for the Muslim woman to expose any of her hidden adornment to the disbelieving woman. For Allah (Mighty and Majestic) only permitted her to expose the places of adornment to the Muslim woman. Therefore, it was not in vain that Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) specified the women before whom a woman may appear as the Muslim women when He said: . He did not say "or women," which would include all women, whether Muslim or disbeliever. He did not say any of that, but rather He said: . So it is not permissible for the Muslim woman to be lenient with the disbelieving servant and appear before her as she appears before the Muslim woman, within these limits mentioned in the Book of Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He).
This is what I wanted to remind you of, and the reminder benefits the believers. Now we will receive your questions to answer them as Allah makes easy. And if anyone has an observation or a question regarding this reminder, perhaps we can cooperate in understanding that question or resolving that issue.