Before I started to write the reply to this letter, I tried to look up the specific question of a husband preventing his wife from seeing her parents in books of Fiqh and books that speak extensively about the status of women in Islam. I referred to numerous books, but my efforts produced only the result I had expected. There was next to nothing on this specific question. This is not surprising because the whole question of preventing a married woman from visiting her parents is, to an Islamic scholar, unthinkable. What right does a man think he has over his wife's feelings and duties to stop her from seeing her parents? Does he, by chance, think that by marrying her he has come to own her? Does he put her in the same category or the same relationship to him as a goat he buys? If so, then he is certainly mistaken. From the Islamic point of view, the relationship between a man and his wife is one between two human beings of equal status. Each of them has certain rights and certain duties, but neither of them can negate the independent personality of the other.

It is simply unacceptable from the Islamic point of view that a husband should consider that the marriage divides his wife's life into two separate stages and that each stage is completely isolated from the other. If he tries to impose this situation, then he will have a wife who is disillusioned, broken-hearted and totally lacking in the ability to impart to her children the proper values of kindness to family relations and dutifulness to parents. How could she, when she herself is denied the right to maintain her relationship with her parents?

The fact is that dutifulness to parents is a duty imposed by Allah on all children, boys and girls, men and women, single or married. This dutifulness does not stop at any particular stage in any-one's existence. It extends throughout the parents' and the children's lives. Being dutiful to one's parents is not considered to have been completed when they die. Their children are required to continue to show dutifulness to them by showing respect and kind treatment to their friends and relatives, supplicating on their behalf, praying Allah to have mercy on them, reading the Qur'an and giving sadaqah or charitable donations on their behalf, etc. When such a claim parents have against their children, how is it possible that a husband thinks of preventing his wife from visiting her parents?

If he does, then he certainly is unjust to her, unless he has a very good reason for his action which can only be imagined in isolated cases. An example may be seen in the case of parents who try to persuade their daughter to be rebellious against her husband or encourage her to seek divorce. But we are not talking about those isolated cases here. We are referring to ordinary situations.

In these, a man should consider, what his feelings would be like if his sister was prevented from seeing their parents by her unreasonable husband? He should extend to his wife the same treatment he would like to see extended to his dearest sister. My reader is asking about the case of a woman's parents being ill or old and requiring frequent visits.

My answer is that she should try as much as she can to look after them, and her husband should help her to do so. She should certainly not neglect her own household duties, but she can try to make the necessary arrangements to enable her to look after her parents and her husband at the same time. Her husband can help her in many ways such as driving her, if he has a car, to her parents' home, or fetching her from there when she wants to come back, putting their young children to bed when she is looking after her parents, relieving her of her cooking duties if the situation requires that, etc. These are matters of common sense. He should feel very happy when her parents express their gratitude to him and pray Allah to reward him and his wife. He should realize that such supplication is certainly answered. It can bring him and his family only good. It may be customary in a certain community to consider that the eldest son bears the greatest responsibility in looking after his parents, but this is not the Islamic view. In Islam, all sons and daughters are responsible, each according to his or her means. If sons are the ones to provide financial help and looking after their parents' material needs, paying the expenses of their living and medical treatment, then daughters can also help by providing the necessary care and nursing, etc. If one of the children fails to do his duty, then the others should not wait for him, but provide what is needed without hesitation. Suppose, that the eldest son is the richest in the family, but he happens to be stingy, unwilling to pay for his parents' needs. Suppose also that all the other children are of limited means. They still have to look after their parents. They cannot say that their rich brother does not help, so they cannot do much on their own. They should look at the case as if their rich brother was not there. What would they do in that case? Leave their parents to suffer? Certainly not. Therefore, they should collaborate in looking after them.

If an elderly couple have only daughters and they are all married, and the couple need to be looked after, then their daughters should try their best to look after them. Islam does not accept that such elderly parents should be abandoned simply because their daughters are married. How can it be so when kindness to all relatives is an Islamic duty. When we speak of relatives here we are not simply speaking of brothers, sisters, uncles and aunts, but of distant relatives also who are separated by two or three grades of relationship. We are still required to be kind to them and to show them that we care for them. A religion that makes this a duty incumbent on all its followers cannot condone the action of a husband who arbitrarily refuses his wife permission to visit her parents. Good Muslims have a different sense of duty. With Muslims nowadays traveling all over the world, either to pursue their education or to find better employment, there are countless women who live away from their home cities and villages only to accompany their husbands and raise their own families. The overwhelming majority of Muslim men in this situation take their wives home as frequently as possible to give them a chance to see their parents and families. If the husbands cannot go themselves, then they send their wives home for such visits. To think of the other extreme is simply not acceptable. If a husband threatens his wife with divorce for visiting her parents, he is unjust to her and to them. Injustice is forbidden in Islam. Allah says in a Qudsi Hadith: "My servants, I have forbidden injustice and have made injustice forbidden to you. Do not be unjust to one another." If it is forbidden to be unjust to a person whom we do not know, it is far more strongly forbidden to be unjust to the closest relative, one's wife to whom the Prophet has urged us to be very kind.

Nor is it permissible for a Muslim to obey anyone encouraging him to be unjust to his wife, not even his parents. If your parents insist that you treat your wife harshly or unjustly, you should realize that injustice represents disobedience to Allah. The Prophet says: "No creature may be obeyed in what constitutes disobedience to the Creator."

It is a man's duty to provide his wife with a suitable home according to his means and of the standard considered reasonable in her social status. If he wants her to live with his parents, then he should explain this right at the beginning. She should be aware of what awaits her when she gets married to him. If she moves into his parents' home and she is unhappy there, then it is her right to ask her husband to provide her with an independent home.

As you realize, Allah has guarantied that the message of Islam will be preserved intact for all time because He wants it to be implemented in human life in all ages and in all communities. Therefore, He has made it adaptable to all situations, so that people cannot argue that the conditions prevailing in their community make it impossible to implement the divine message. This is one of the essential characteristics of Islam which add to its strength.

There is no doubt that social conditions differ from one community to another. We cannot compare a tribal or nomadic community to the social conditions prevailing in an industrialized society. Indeed, the conditions within the same country differ from rural to urban areas. How, then, can one set of teachings be applicable to all communities in all ages? The answer is found in the fact that Islam provides certain guide-lines and allows every community to conduct its life the way it likes, within the framework provided by its general guide-lines and principles. In the overall social set up, Islam defines rights and duties. However, where it is possible for a human being to usurp the rights of others, Islam defines these rights very clearly. Moreover, Islam establishes a perfect balance between rights and responsibilities. It is not acceptable from the Islamic point of view that a certain person enjoys certain rights without having to fulfill certain duties in return. Otherwise, if a person can require another to do certain things by way of duty, without giving that person certain rights, that becomes a case of exploitation which leads to much injustices. It goes without saying that exploitation and injustice undermine the very existence of any community in which they prevail. A relationship which involves injustice is hateful to Allah. He says in a Qudsi Hadith: "My servants, I have forbidden Myself injustice and I have made injustice forbidden to you. Therefore, do not be unjust to one another."

With regard to family relations, Islam imposes certain duties on both husband and wife in return for certain rights which it assigns to each of them. The balance between the rights and duties of each is a perfect one. In this way, Islam secures a happy life for the family. When both husband and wife fulfill their duties, they will enjoy their rights.

According to Islam, a woman is not required to work in order to earn her living. Her husband is responsible to ensure a decent standard of living for her according to his means. Even when a woman is richer than her husband, her wealth does not deprive her of the right to be supported by him. If he takes advantage of her wealth in order to leave his duty unfilled, without having first secured her consent to this arrangement, then he is accountable for his misdeed. It is open to her to seek divorce on grounds of her not being supported by her husband. An Islamic court will have no hesitation to issue an order nullifying the marriage if the husband will not honor his responsibility.

It may be useful to add here that an unmarried woman also does not need to work for her living. She is entitled to be supported by her parents or her immediate relatives, such as her brothers. However, if a woman decides to work, Islam does not stop her from doing so.

It is important to know what rights and duties become applicable when a woman takes up employment. It is common knowledge that Islam considers a woman equal to man with regard to the rights of ownership and disposal of property as well as conducting her own business transactions and commercial dealings. Therefore, when a woman earns something from her work, her earnings belong totally to her. If she is unmarried, her father cannot claim her earnings as his own. Similarly, a woman's husband cannot put any claim to her earnings.

It may be suggested here that when a married woman goes out to work, she leaves her household duties undone. Therefore, the husband is entitled, or so it is claimed, at least to share of the salary or earnings of his wife. We have to examine this argument a little more carefully.

The duties of a wife toward her husband, according to Islamic law, are well defined. They do not include doing any cleaning, ironing, cooking or any other household work. Marriage is a contractual relationship which allows a man and woman to fulfill their desires in a legitimate way. If a woman takes an undertaking which prevents her from meeting that responsibility, then her husband has the right to prevent that undertaking.

Someone may ask at this point: Who is then to do the housework? The answer is two fold:

If we are speaking strictly from the points of view of rights and duties, it is not the duty of the woman to do the housework in her husband's home. If he wants the work done, he has to see to it that it is done. Life is not all about rights and duties. There is much more in the marital relationship than duties and rights. There is what Islam terms "companionship based on goodwill." It is under this heading that the duties and responsibilities of the family are divided among the husband and wife. When we ask for guide-lines on this particular point, they are readily available.

At a certain stage, there was some disagreement between Fatimah, the Prophet's daughter and her husband, Ali who was the Prophet's cousin. They put their disagreement to him, requesting him to define their responsibilities for them. The Prophet said to his daughter: "You do the work that must be done inside the home, and he does what need to be done outside." This division of the family work is both fair and practical.

What we may deduce from all this is that if a woman does not do the work that has to be done inside the family home, she fails on meeting the requirement of the companionship and goodwill. It is open to her husband to divorce her if she persistently refuses to do it. She may argue that it is not her duty, but as we have said, there is much more to family life than strict duties.

When a woman wants to go out to work, her husband may prevent her from doing so, if he feels that her job will seriously affect the family, especially with regard to the upbringing of the children. However, if she was working when they got married, and he has not indicated to her at the time of his proposal that he wants her to quit her job, this is taken as consent on his part to her working. He may not withdraw that consent after marriage. It is not open to him then to ask her to leave her job. If she refuses, she is within her rights. This is absolutely fair, because the fact that he has not made his intention clear to her about her continued working is regarded as agreement to the situation which obtained before their marriage.

As for the salary she receives from her work, or indeed her earnings, these belong to her. She may determine how she uses her income. If she wants to help her own family with part or all of her income, she is only being dutiful and she will be rewarded by Allah for being so. In this particular case, which we are examining, there is no doubt that the husband is taking advantage of his wife. To claim that what she earns belongs to him, is absolutely unjust. He cannot justify it in any way. If she does not agree to give it to him, he is taking it unlawfully. He may not treat it as his own money. He must obtain her permission before taking it. If she does not give him that permission, he must not touch it.