Assalamualaikum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh.
Dear Muslims,
I have been wanting to write about this for quite some time but haven’t had the opportunity till this morning after subuh, here in Kuantan.
Cikgu Nur Aliya Yeoh’s posting here about her shopping for her tudung’s experience has triggered me to sit and compose this article addressing a matter which is actually getting from bad to worse by the day.
This is concerning the way the hijab @ tudung is being over commercialized and turned from a piece of clothing commanded by Allah the All Knowing’s standing order to the Women of Faith in Islam into now becoming an absurd piece of fashion apparel that deviates far from being what it is supposed to be ~ a symbol of modesty!
In Surah An Nur Verse 31, Holy Al Qur’an Al Kareem, Allah commands :
Waqul lilmu/minati yaghdudnamin absarihinna wayahfathnafuroojahunna wala yubdeena zeenatahunna illa mathahara minha walyadribnabikhumurihinna AAala juyoobihinna wala yubdeenazeenatahunna illa libuAAoolatihinna aw aba-ihinnaaw aba-i buAAoolatihinna aw abna-ihinna awabna-i buAAoolatihinna aw ikhwanihinna aw baneeikhwanihinna aw banee akhawatihinna aw nisa-ihinnaaw ma malakat aymanuhunna awi attabiAAeenaghayri olee al-irbati mina arrijali awi attifliallatheena lam yathharoo AAala AAawratiannisa-i wala yadribnabi-arjulihinna liyuAAlama ma yukhfeena min zeenatihinnawatooboo ila Allahi jameeAAan ayyuhaalmu/minoona laAAallakum tuflihoon
And tell the believing women to reduce [some] of their vision and guard their private parts and not expose their adornment except that which [necessarily] appears thereof and to wrap [a portion of] their headcovers over their chests and not expose their adornment except to their husbands, their fathers, their husbands’ fathers, their sons, their husbands’ sons, their brothers, their brothers’ sons, their sisters’ sons, their women, that which their right hands possess, or those male attendants having no physical desire, or children who are not yet aware of the private aspects of women. And let them not stamp their feet to make known what they conceal of their adornment. And turn to Allah in repentance, all of you, O believers, that you might succeed.
The translation is absolutely clear to those who have the common sense and rationality to comprehend what God Almighty is ordering them to do as far as protecting their modesty but obviously in these Last Ages, we can all see that despite all the scientific and technological advancements that most of us mankind have achieved or are enjoying as fruits of our learned scientists and researchers / inventors have given us, some humans seem to have a tendency to deviate and reduce themselves to being mere objects of lust and sleaze regardless of all the guidance that has been revealed to us by The Almighty through the ages.
Take modesty away from us and we are no better than the beasts and animals of the wild.
The only thing that differentiates us from such creatures are our sense of modesty, rational thinking and creativity that has been gifted to us by Allah the Most Compassionate, Most Merciful.
It’s in our nature to have a sexual attraction towards the opposite sex. This is part and parcel of our being. Those who go against this natural order are those who are sick and depraved, a product of their own deviated self’s and destined for the unimaginable terrors and pain of being burnt over and over again in the pits of the hellfires.
Modesty prevails amongst those who have faith. Those who have none tend to go about exposing themselves to the sight and views of others equally inclined to give vent to their base instincts and do not give a damn about the consequences of their depravity!
When our Mother Sayyidatina Hawwa Radhiallahu Anha and our Father, the Prophet Adam Alaihis Salam lost their heavenly clothing after consuming the Forbidden Fruit in Paradise as a result of listening to the coaxing of the accursed Syaitan, they immediately felt ashamed of their nakedness and frantically tried to cover their areas of modesty by trying to pluck the leaves of plants and trees in Jannah!
None of the plants and trees were willing to give their leaves to be used as such by Adam and Hawwa save for the Fig tree.
Hence the mention of the fig tree in the opening verse of Surah At Tin.
Watteeni wazzaytoon
By the fig and the olive
My dear fellow Muslims,
It is not enough for us just to declare our faith and not follow up such a declaration by carrying out our studies and learning more about our chosen Way of Life.
Islam is known by reason and as thinking people, we who claim to submit ourselves to Allah the All Wise, All Knowing, Supreme Creator of all the universes ought to go about it in a manner befitting our status as the Children of Adam Alaihis Salam.
We must study conscientiously about our faith and all that it asks of us? Verily, Iman @ Faith does not come easily to each and every one of us who claim to be Muslims @ Believers in Al-Islam.
We are born free from sin and are as blank sheets of paper or to be relevant in these times of such advancements in science, technology and knowledge can be regarded as blank compact discs or programmable devices?
We are born devoid of knowledge save for those who were created by Allah to be our prophets and awliyas @ auliyas.
Each of us are born and then raised by our parents or guardians according to our circumstances and prevailing situations. Some of us are gifted to be able to learn quickly and prevail over others. Some are not. Each of us then do what we can to learn and equip ourselves with all such necessary skills and know how in order to advance ourselves in our life’s according to our capabilities and efforts.
For those of us who choose to be true Muslims, we study about what our faith of Islam teaches us through the Final Commandments of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta’ala through His Revelations in the Holy Al Qur’an Al Kareem and the authentic Hadiths of Allah’s Greatest Messenger, the Blessed Prophet Muhammad ibni Abdullah, Sallalahu Alaihi Wassallam.
Among the most notable attributes of Rasulullah Sayyidul Mursalin was his bashfulness. His sense of modesty. A notable trait. Worthy to be emulated by each of us, his ummah.
We are Muslims. Servants of Allah, Azza Wa Jalla.
Allah loves those who care for themselves, protect their modesty and raise their self’s to be above those who are crude and the depraved, vulgar ones amongst the teeming masses of humanity.
It is not befitting for any Muslim, male and female to expose his or her areas of modesty to be ogled upon or purveyed by those who do not have the rights to do so through the union of holy blessed matrimony in the private sanctum of their abodes or dwellings.
Generally speaking, from my studies on human behavior, I have come to conclude the following:
First, they’d look at the face. If the face is pretty, they’d focus just on that.
If the face is average or downright repulsive, their attention would then waver off to the bosom.
If that area isn’t attractive enough for them, then they’d move on to the posterior. Face, Bosom, Posterior. Finito!
This is generally what normal men all over the world look at when viewing women.
Those who claim otherwise are just great pretenders or simply not right. They might be those who are queers, faggots or just some kind of sick, depraved creatures with some distorted sense of inequalities or sexual disorders.
I don’t wish to speculate as to what women look for in us men?
Back to the main topic.
The hijab.
It ought to be a piece of clothing, best sewn in the form of what we here in Malaysia come to know as the ‘tudung labuh’ or which covers the bosom areas of a grown women adequately.
It ought to be in plain colors or light pastel. No frills or attachments. Not striking. Not transparent or flimsy. Comfortable. Not tight or flush against one’s form so as not to reveal the shape or size of the female’s bosom. Just simple and nice. As per Allah’s Commandment.
Nowadays, the way they sell such hijabs border upon the absurd and the ludicrous! They have now resorted to adding bling blings to the hijabs and dingly, dangly ornaments that make them look like circus freaks or hijabis gone stir crazy!!!
The matter is made worse when we have the so called celebrities and artistes cashing in upon the trend to become hijab models but are ill-informed as to what is right and what is apparently not!
Cases in example are the following local Malaysian celebrities who are engaged as hijab models:
Let’s start with TV3 host, Wardina Safiyya Wilmot Fadhlullah.
She has a tendency to resort to tabarruj @ overly making herself up that leads to drawing attention to herself.
The hijab doesn’t cover her bosom area at all and does the opposite as far as being modest is concerned.
In Wardina’s case, she is one classic example of a Muslimah who ought to don the niqab because she is way too pretty to go about exposing her face to those who are not her mahram.
She’d cause traffic accidents because normal men might get distracted by her beauty. 😛
She’d do better to don a lengthier hijab covering herself properly. Even when she went without makeup and donned a black hijab that covered herself much more better than in the above photos of her, she is still quite an attractive Muslimah and we can all see that.
No offense to Wardina but just a friendly advise from Tok Mamu here. 🙂 Please be a bit more modest when appearing before the public and before the tv studio cameras or posing for the media.
Next we have the following weird style of the so called hijabs or tudungs:
Siti Nurhaliza is notorious for her weird sense of head coverings.
This particular one had me going ‘What the ..???
It looks like something that the ‘warong makciks’ use to cover their cookies on the table…:P
One thing for sure, the flies won’t be able to set upon her coiffure!
Hehehehe…
All these styles border upon the weird world of Malaysian tudung mania that do not fulfill the requirements of a proper hijab.
And the weirdness gets even worse! Here’s an example :
Now, what do you make of that?
Surely, one would need to have at least a wee bit of commonsense before embarking on such a crazy decision to wear shorts and sport a hijab as well?
She could have at least worn long track pants as her friend besides her?
What was she thinking???
Its a crazy world out there and these Muslimah’s ought to know better than to make a mockery out of themselves and their chosen way to don their ideas of what a hijab ought to be?
You don’t need to be too creative my dears. One does not need to ‘reinvent the wheel’ so to speak!
Just cover yourselves modestly as Allah commands you to and you’ll get your rewards not only here on Earth but in Jannah as well. Insya Allah.
You are all fine ladies but can do better by wearing proper hijabs to cover your modesty.
May Allah bless and guide us all.
Ameen.
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Assalamualaikum wbt. This is what happen to our generation nowadays. Sometimes, the hijab also can make us proud or ego when we wear the beautiful hijab and so on. Sometimes, it is quite difficult to explain to womens about hijab and ask them to close it properly as what our prophet teach us. Certain people want to wear hijab, but they are scared and being ignored by their bestfriends. I was a free hair girl. And it takes time to wear hijab. I was once upon a time who anti it so badly, but, who knows, suddenly i change until i wear niqab. it was fun actually in islam..but people tend to make it narrow and tight. but now i am scared, because my faith is not like what i wear now..still climbing the stairs to learn and be ordinary muslimah.
Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri, Maaf Zahir dan Batin to all Muslims
asalaamu alaikum wr wb. While I do agree with 95% of what you say brother. I am in the US and am irked to see both Muslim men AND women trash the hejab, making a joke from it. I wanted to point out 2 things which you neglected.
1) the hejab is NOT just about a headscarf. Its about proper, modest attire, behavior and piety for both Muslim men and women! This includes covering the curves for both genders and modest behavior-i.e. not looking at the opposite gender. You should have touched on that as it came off to me, that you were solely mentioning hejab in the sense of a head scarf and modest dress and neglecting to entire sense of hejab and the male as well as female versions.
2) while I agree those "hejabi" celebrities are indeed not taking the hejab properly…
I do not think it was advisable to suggest a sister cover her face because she is so pretty. Firstly, from the scholarly viewpoint, most Muslim scholars from all the madhabs do not say the niqab is fard, its a good act but not required. Pretty looks or ugly looks have no bearing. Its about modesty, and thats it. Two, telling a sister to cover he face because she is pretty is also degrading the niqab! Thats like telling a sister who you deem ugly to take off her niqab because…well, noone will look at you anyway! Brother, thats not a good view. Infact its upon Muslim MEN to have modesty and hayah and to lower THERE gaze and NOT look at the muhajabaat or munaqabaat in the first place! Its a sin upon the man to do this and a sin upon the woman to do things to attract their looks. Now if a sister is very beautiful, as long as she is not going around trying to get attention then there is no sin upon her if she doesnt wear niqab. and vise-versa…also putting on the niqab is no guarantee that beautiful sister will not be even MORE beautiful. Ive lived in Saudi and I can tell you, many men prefer women IN Niqab because they look mysterious, also many women in niqab use it to there advantage to look even prettier.
hence, it boils down to ones intentions…and its on BOTH genders to ensure they follow their requirements for hejab as the hejab is just not obligatory upon women and is not just a scarf and modest attire. but the whole package, ditto for men.
assalamu'alaykum warahmatullaah. .
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Iman always ups n downs. .they may have reasons for applying such decission. .also, human is weak in their heart. .but Allaah always knows what in their n our hearts. .
so, lets pray for each other as muslim bros n sists to be better muslims by each day. Wish Allah to grand us His hidayah. .Amin. .