Men and Women in Islam: Equal or Equally Balanced?

Men are not superior to women and women are not superior to men in Islam. Allah Almighty makes it perfectly clear that those superior are those who have more taqwa (god fearing consciousness) In Islam, men and women do not have equal rights, but their rights are different because of their nature. Their rights are equally balanced.

Let me quote Dr Zakir Naik from his lecture "Women's Right in Islam Modernizing or Outdated?"

As I said in the beginning of my talk, Islam believes in equality between men and women - Equality does not mean identicality.

Suppose in a classroom 2 students, student ‘A’ and ‘B’, during an examination both come out first - Both secure 80% marks - 80 out of 100

When you analyze the question paper, the question paper has 10 different questions, each carrying 10 marks.

In question 1 student ‘A’ got 9 out of 10, and student ‘B’ got 7 out of 10 - So in question 1 student ‘A’ was higher than student ‘B’.

In question 2, student ‘A’ got 7 out of 10 and student ‘B’ got 9 out of 10,
- Student ‘B’ was higher than student ‘A’ in question number 2.

So when we add up the marks of all the ten questions, both student ‘A’ and ‘B’ got 80 out of 100

In some question ‘A’ is higher than ‘B’, in some question ‘B’ is higher than ‘A’, in others both are equal

In the same fashion, taking the example that since Allah has given man more strength - Suppose a thief enters the house will you tell, ‘I believe in women’s rights - I believe in women’s rights’ - will you tell your mother, your sister and your daughter, to go and fight the thief?’

No, but natural you’ll fight him - If required they may interfere - under normal circumstances since Allah has given you more physical strength, you have to go and tackle the thief.

Let us take another example where… where it comes to giving respect to the -where it comes to respecting the parents - The children are supposed to respect the mother 3 times more than the father.

Yes it is true, the child is supposed to treat his or her mother better than the father. Here is the hadith...

SAHIH MUSLIM, BOOK 32: The Book of Virtue, Good Manners and Joining of the Ties of Relationship (Kitab Al-Birr was-Salat-I-wa'l-Adab)

The Prophet emphasized the greatness of the sin of some one disobeying his or her mother more than the father.

Chapter 31: THE USE OF THE WORD" UNBELIEF" IN CASE OF SLANDERING (ANYONE) OR ONE'S LINEAGE, AND LAMENTATION

Here we see that one of the seven deadly sins is slandering chaste women. How come slandering men is not there? Slandering men indeed is a great sin however, the sin for slandering chaste women is worse. See the honor that God Almighty has given to Muslim women in order to preserve and maintain their honor.

There are only a couple of examples to show that women might seem to have more rights in certain areas than men, while men have more rights than women in certain areas as well.

* Science: GENETICALLY, women are less interested in math, problem solving and engineering than men.

(Click to play video)

Although physiologically speaking, men are not smarter than women, but genetically speaking, it's been scientifically proven that women have LESSER INTEREST than men in mathematics, problem solving and engineering.

Also, women in primitive societies were much more involved in raising children, cooking, milking, harvesting, and taking care of the family. Men were primarily more involved in trading, commerce, financial transactions, defense and all of the other physical jobs, such as metal smith, harvesting, carpentry, and other jobs.

Allah Almighty Said in the Glorious Quran:

"O ye who believe! When ye deal with each other, in transactions involving future obligations in a fixed period of time, reduce them to writing; let a scribe write down faithfully as between the parties: let not the scribe refuse to write: as God Has taught him, so let him write. Let him who incurs the liability dictate, but let him fear His Lord God, and not diminish aught of what he owes. If they party liable is mentally deficient, or weak, or unable Himself to dictate, let his guardian dictate faithfully, and get two witnesses, out of your own men, and if there are not two men, then a man and two women, such as ye choose, for witnesses, so that if one of them errs, the other can remind her...." (The Noble Quran, 2:282)

Does Science support the Quran's Claim?

These videos demonstrate the Scientific Proofs for these claims from renowned Biologist Dr. Lewis Wolpert and others...