The Burdens On Women

The burdens on her shoulders | خدمة المرأة لزوجها

Islamically speaking – a woman does NOT have to:

– Cook food
– Wash clothes
– Clean the home
– Iron Clothes
– And so on …

In other words brothers:

When our mothers, wives and daughters carry out these tasks at home, we should consider it their voluntary favour upon us, and not think they owe us.

Imam Nawawi says in his ‘Sharh’ of Sahih Muslim (7/138):

أن المرأة تخدم زوجها بهذه الأمور المذكورة ونحوها من الخبز والطبخ وغسل الثياب وغير ذلك
وكله تبرع من المرأة وإحسان منها إلى زوجها وحسن معاشرة وفعل معروف معه
ولا يجب عليها شيء من ذلك ، بل لو امتنعت من جميع هذا لم تأثم ، ويلزمه هو تحصيل هذه الأمور لها ، ولا يحل له إلزامها بشيء من هذا ، وإنما تفعله المرأة تبرعا ، وهي عادة جميلة استمر عليها النساء من الزمن الأول إلى الآن

“The wife serves her husband by performing duties which we mentioned before and similar acts such as baking, cooking and washing clothes and other things.

All of these duties are from her voluntary benevolence, as a favour upon her husband. These are acts of good cohabitation from her side and acting good towards him.

None of these acts are mandatory upon her.

Even if she refuses to perform all of these duties, she will not be sinful.

Nor is it permissible for the husband to force his wife to do these things.

The woman should perform these tasks out of goodness.
This has been a beautiful practice of women from the past until now.”

[End Quote.]

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This is the opinion of the majority of classical scholars, going back more than 1,000 years – all the way to the time of the 4 Imaams.

They say: if the husband is well off, he should hire a servant, provide his wife ready made clothes and cooked meals.

The Prophet used to serve himself in the house, as is well-known.

A minority of scholars disagrees with this and say that it is an obligation on her to perform these duties.

IMPORTANT NOTE:

Just because God did not say: “women should to the cooking”, it does not mean that husband and wife should not fairly split household tasks.

It does not mean that the man should to everything and the woman should to nothing.

A marriage is ‘give and take’, not only take.

These things are left for the ‘Urf (culture/customs) – and it’s important for people to respect the ‘Urf – unlike what the feminists are saying.

If people don’t respect the ‘Urf – then the entire family structure will break apart.

If in your culture, it is the norm that the woman does these things then you should already assume that your husband expects these things from you.

If you don’t want to do these things – you have to make it clear before you agree to marry that person.

And performing these tasks does not make you a slave or a servant, as the feminists are saying.

The wives of the Prophet and Sahabiyaat also used to help their husbands in the house.

These are good and rewardable acts and husbands should help their wives with these tasks, as the Prophet would.

It does not make men feminine.