Is it unjust partiality, in Islam's eyes, to feel special sympathy for women because of the deprivation and abuse they have suffered? Prothom Alo's religion desk answers from the Quran, hadith and classical scholars: compassion for the oppressed is not a sin but an expression of love for justice.
The partisanship Islam strictly forbids is called asabiyyah: blindly backing the wrongs of one's own group, clan or sex regardless of truth. In a narration in Sunan Abu Dawud (hadith 5119), the companion Wathila ibn al-Asqa asked whether loving one's own people was asabiyyah. The Prophet answered that it was not; asabiyyah is helping one's people in wrongdoing.
Explaining the distinction in Majmu al-Fatawa, Imam Ibn Taymiyyah wrote that grieving at the plight of one's own people is a natural human tendency that Islam does not forbid; it becomes forbidden only when someone abandons justice and sides with their group to wrong others.
The piece cites verse 75 of Surah an-Nisa, which calls believers to strive for the deliverance of helpless men, women and children. In Imam al-Qurtubi's commentary, women and children are named separately because they are less able to defend themselves, so standing up for their rights is a demand of faith.
The Prophet's own teaching points the same way, the desk writes. In his farewell sermon he told men to fear God in their treatment of women (Sahih Muslim, hadith 1218), and on journeys he warned camel drivers to go gently so as not to harm the women, whom he likened to glass vessels (Sahih al-Bukhari, hadith 6149).
Nursing anger or venting on social media is not a solution, in the desk's view. It lists practical steps instead: legal and social support for women deprived through dowry, domestic violence or inheritance; training in counselling and social work; and helping with the education of disadvantaged girls and women's self-employment.
It also cautions that such sympathy must not turn into hostility towards men or the breakdown of families. Quoting verse 71 of Surah at-Tawbah, it concludes that believing men and believing women are not rivals but allies of one another.
Source: Prothom Alo
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