"The new generation of Muslim women is a questioning generation, influenced by science, technology and the Information Age. I recall the time a girlfriend from an American Muslim family asked me why women cover their faces in Saudi Arabia. I told her what I remembered from books and what we had been taught about it in the madrasa (religious school): that it is sinful (a3ura) for a woman to show her face. “What is a3ura?” she asked me. When I tried to translate the word literally, I became aware for the first time that in using this word, we compare a woman’s face to her genitals.
“Are you really telling me that God creates my face, places four of my five senses there, and then instructs me to conceal it because it compares with my genitals?” she said.
I didn’t have an answer at the time, but our discussion formed the beginning of a long search to find the origin of the hadith I had told her about. I found that no such hadith exists, and that it was merely a fabrication being used to subjugate woman to cover their faces, an imposition which is contrary to human nature."
“Are you really telling me that God creates my face, places four of my five senses there, and then instructs me to conceal it because it compares with my genitals?” she said.
I didn’t have an answer at the time, but our discussion formed the beginning of a long search to find the origin of the hadith I had told her about. I found that no such hadith exists, and that it was merely a fabrication being used to subjugate woman to cover their faces, an imposition which is contrary to human nature."
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