For Those Left Behind
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Ep. 14: Women Praying Janazah and Visiting Graves | For Those Left Behind
Can a woman attend a funeral in Islam? Can a woman pray Janazah and visit the graveyard? How do we reconcile legal opinions regarding the permissible and prohibited in regards to women participating in the Janazah with our current circumstances? And what practices are permissible and prohibited for men and women at the burial and their conduct at the graveyard?
Chapters:
00:00 Introduction
01:18 Can women pray Janazah?
Attending the Janazah prayer, whether it is in the masjid or on a lawn, is allowed for both men and women.
02:04 What is prohibited for both men and women?
It is prohibited for both men and women to wail. Wailing is prohibited because it causes harm to the dead.
02:45 Are women allowed to visit the graveyard?
Visiting the graveyard is permissible for women. Aisha (ra) said that, "He (the Prophet ﷺ) used to prohibit us, then he commanded us to visit them". This applied to both men and women, as long as the women abstained from being known as those who would frequent the graveyard, wail excessively in the graveyard or did not observe modesty at the graveyard.
04:40 Are women allowed to attend the burial?
06:01 How men and women should conduct themselves at the graveyard
Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. There are so many sisters in the community who have never had the experience of seeing someone buried and actually going through the process that we've been talking about of watching someone that you knew go underground, the dirt coming on them, and the finality of that process as it takes place here. As-salatu wa ala mu'atihi wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu And subhanAllah, there are many ways to experience death and in a growing climate of materialism where people are further deluded by life and we're certainly encountering so much that's harmful in terms of greed and materialism and how we assign value to ourselves and to our lives. Encountering death is so important and experiencing it, you know, even in other ways, whether it's ghusl of the dead body, being there with someone when they pass away, you know, being with the family, comforting the family. There are other ways to encounter death and to be in close proximity to it that would soften the heart, right? But there is nothing quite like the graveyard. There's nothing quite like seeing a person go underground or seeing the graveyard in general and being there. Now, traditionally speaking, there is ikhtilaf, there is a difference of opinion in regards to where women could participate when it comes to the janazah, when it comes to the graveyard, when it comes to the burial. And I want to unpack this just a little bit inshaAllah ta'ala and start off with what is permissible across the board and what is prohibited across the board. So we start off with what is permissible. Attending salatul janazah is unanimously permitted for women, even traditionally in Islamic law, right? To go to the janazah and to pray the janazah, to attend it in the masjid or on the lawn or wherever it may be, to pray salatul janazah and biidh Allah ta'ala to have the
same reward, the qirat, that is the likeness of uhud in good deeds. InshaAllah ta'ala that's assured there. What is prohibited across the board, exceedingly prohibited in fact, and causes harm to the dead. So it's not just that it is sinful for the person but could harm the dead, is niyaha, is wailing. And in the time of the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, though wailing was prohibited for men and women, that means screaming loudly and shouting out things and tearing clothes and things of that sort, it was a particular practice that was associated in jahliyah with the women that would go out and that were professionals at wailing and doing these things to show grief for the dead. And so the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam prohibited and in fact cursed those that do niyaha, whether it is men or women. Now here we have everything that's in between, right? The salatul janazah which is permitted for men and women across the board unanimously and then the um the niyaha which is prohibited for men and women. And then you have what's in between, which is following the janazah and then going to visit the graveyard. When it comes to going to visit the graveyard, there is a narration from Aisha radiAllahu ta'ala Anha, she was actually returning back from the Baqir and someone asked her where are you coming from, oh umul mu'mineen, oh mother of the believers, where are you coming from? So she said I went to visit my brother Abdur Rahman and the response was didn't the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam prohibit that? And Aisha radiAllahu ta'ala Anha responded and she said that the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam used to prohibit it, okay? Naha an ziyaratul quboor, he used to prohibit it and then the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam amara bi ziyaratiha, he in fact commanded people uh to go and visit the graveyards because it reminds you of death. So what Aisha radiAllahu ta'ala Anha was
saying is that the prohibition on visiting the graves was for men and women but there is a particular emphasis on women because of the practice of niyaha. But then when the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam commanded the companions and made it not just permissible but made it recommended to go and to visit the graves that that included women as well so long as they continue to abstain from either being known as those that would frequent the graveyards or those that would wail excessively, mourn excessively in the graveyards or those that would not observe uh the hijab in the graveyard and things of that sort. So visiting the graves according to a large group of scholars, visiting the graveyard is permitted especially in accordance with this narration from Aisha radiAllahu ta'ala Anha. Now some of the scholars made a difference between a differentiation between following the janaza and going to the graveyard outside of the janaza and this is based upon you know primarily narrations that aren't necessarily authentic but there is an authentic narration from Mu'atiyah Um Atiyah radiAllahu Anha says that we were forbidden to accompany the janaz, to accompany the janaz. This means follow the procession but not strictly, not strictly. Now again where is this in the timeline? Is it when it was prohibited to uh to do so as a whole or is it afterwards and this remains? So many of the scholars mention a dislike which is what seems to be indicated by Um Atiyah radiAllahu ta'ala Anha and a lot of the scholars you know went into different reasoning for that right and they said that at the end of the day it's the practices that are frowned upon and the practices of wailing and the practices of mourning and obviously following the janaza and going through the entire process would cause more distress is a more uh tasking environment and hard thing to encounter than going to the graveyard outside of the janaza. And then some
of the scholars they say that it's about the elements. If a woman abstains from the elements that are prohibited then she is permitted to even accompany the funeral procession and to witness that. One of the evidences that some of the scholars actually use is an incident that's very famous that the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam came across a woman that was weeping over her lost child and as she was weeping the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam told her to be patient and she responded and she said you know what do you know about my tragedy what do you know about my musiba and the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam walked away and some of the people told that woman do you know who that was and she said who they said it was the messenger of Allah SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam so she immediately goes to apologize to the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam mentions to her what As-sabr ainda as-sadmat al-ula that true patience is at the first stroke of calamity. So some of the scholars mentioned that the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam did not remark on her being present or her grief but rather the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam taught a valuable lesson in patience at those moments and that is the type of patience that is needed for anyone that walks that trail. It's not just observing the rules it's also making sure that we derive the full benefit and that's true for both men and for women.
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