# Was Aisha a feminist? - URL: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/tr4-gh0qez4/s/8/ - Date: 2020-08-04 · Kind: question · Transcript tier: machine · Recording: Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth #176 *Q&A Unscripted & Unrestricted!* 🤣 (36:32–41:19) - Status: general teaching - Watch from the start of the segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TR4-gh0qEZ4&t=2192s - Recording page: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/tr4-gh0qez4/ **Topics:** Women in Islam; The wives of the Prophet; Reports demeaning women **Question as asked:** Was Aisha a feminist? **Summary (not a quotation; machine-made, unchecked):** Yes, if a feminist means someone who stands up for women's rights, says Mufti Abu Layth; Aisha did, including by rejecting misattributed hadith. **Checked position (checked by two independent reviews, not by the channel):** Mufti Abu Layth says Aisha unquestionably stood up for women's rights. **Evidence, his words at 37:33:** “that unquestionably Aisha was somebody who stood up for women's rights and she has many hadith critiquing certain narrations that people were misattributing to the prophet” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TR4-gh0qEZ4&t=2253s) ## Longer summary Asked whether Aisha was a feminist, Mufti Abu Layth says it depends on whether both sides mean the same thing by the term. If a feminist is someone who stands up for women's rights, then Aisha unquestionably was, and Mufti cites her critiques of narrations wrongly attributed to the Prophet, such as a woman passing in front of a man invalidating his prayer, where she says companions misunderstood. Mufti says that if feminism means man-hating she clearly was not, calls that a wrong hijacking of the term, and says a feminist ought to stand up for everybody's rights, especially women's. Mufti adds that he thinks the man-hating fringe is a modern phenomenon a few decades old, amplified on social media. ## Sources and names cited - Aisha - report: if a woman passes in front of you your prayer becomes invalid ## Transcript (machine tier, 36:32–41:19) [36:05] What was I What was I going to talk about? I was going to say something. Uh let me go back check. Was it to do with Right. Aisha [snorts] um [clears throat] Mustafa A would be interesting. Yeah, I'm sure I've messaged Mustafa Akol. If you do know him, drop him a a message and ask him if he's interested in coming on. [36:32] Cool. Um, lay of the pot lelay of the pot le Oh, [laughter] do we feel that Aisha was a um feminist? Well, of course, but then I I I don't know when we when we say terms like feminist whether the the kind of interpretative repertoire [37:08] the interpretative repertoire in which we're tapping into the kind of shared concepts are the same. I don't know whether what I when I'm saying feminist and the person asking feminist is meaning the same thing. So to me a feminist is if you mean like really it's somebody who ought to stand up for women's rights as well. [37:33] Now um that unquestionably Aisha was somebody who stood up for women's rights and she has many hadith critiquing certain narrations that people were misattributing to the prophet things like oh if a woman walks in front of you your prayer becomes invalid. Um and she actually condemns certain companions for saying that, saying they misunderstood what the prophet was saying. [38:02] And yeah, in that sense, absolutely. But I mean, if you mean like sometimes a feminist is like um like a kind of man-hating um [laughter] it is. Yeah. Am I just there? It is sometimes deemed like that as well. So obviously she wasn't like that. And I think that's a wrong hijacking of the term feminist. To me, a feminist ought to be somebody who stands up for everybody's rights, especially women's rights. [38:32] So, that is really what a feminist is meant to be about an egalitarian society. But you do have uh I think they may be a fringe, but maybe they're more vocal uh on in this day and age. So, you get like a very bitter group that is very kind of almost anti-men. [laughter] They're just anti the XY chromosome. They're just like, [laughter] you know, just men. [38:59] Man. So, um, yeah. I mean, so she clearly wasn't like that. I don't think women gener a modern phenomenon, by the way. Um, I don't know what people think. Is it um I [snorts] I don't think women in the past hate you know I don't think women today do either but I think there is a niche uh uh a kind of a group of women who do think like that are quite man-hating but I don't think historically people were like that. [39:37] I think for the you know this is maybe just at best a few decades old. That's my thoughts. I don't know what other people think about that. Would you go Capill? You're doing it with the super chat. You're doing it. By the way, somebody said that I'd missed some super chats. I did go through this and I couldn't see any. So if you have uh sent any and I haven't answered them uh you can just send the question stating that look this was the super chat and I'll provided I see it I'll definitely go through it right so [40:15] somebody said wka miss Jones I don't know what that means clear we love men of [laughter] of course of course I think really you know this is just a poison that a small group of people just have. Um I think for the most part people ain't like that but it's so amplified it's quite scary cuz um like you know sometimes it's the weirdest of people have the you know the most hollow of drums beat the loudest you know they make the loudest sounds and sometimes you get that um on social media all this echo and I think [40:53] sometimes it does freak a lot of men out um like they are a bit weary about you [laughter] [gasps] So that's um that's interesting and we'll we'll speak a bit about that as I speak about this Netflix TV show. All right. Arranged M uh Indian matchmaking but we'll come to that. [41:18] Is there a biography? Uh, Sheh Ysef Basatin from HT gave a fatwa permitting kissing a woman as long as there is no lust. [laughter] You see, this is where we're going to listen to these fatawa and then there's going to be a scandal and then this is going to be us. ## Cite Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment TR4-gh0qEZ4/s/8. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/tr4-gh0qez4/s/8/ Not a fatwa: these answers were given to specific people at specific times. Ask a qualified scholar about your own situation.