FEMALE INHERITANCE: WHO SAYS THEY HAVE NO RIGHT TO PATRIMONY? John, a poor young man, fell in love with Pearl, the only daughter of a very rich man. Neither the pride of Pearls rich parents nor Johns parents fear of the constant threats by Pearls parents allowed the relationship to sail smoothly. Unfortunately, Johns poor parents bowed to povertys bite and died, leaving John without a thing by way of inheritance. He was left to struggle for his survival. Pearl loved her poor lover with extreme love all the same. Two years later her parents too died. Before he died, her father had written his Will and all his children were included - male and female. When Pearl got her share of her fathers wealth, she thought to herself I have found something with which to give a life to my beloved John and so she established for John a business of his choice with her share of the inheritance, and he became a success in a few years, got married to her and vowed all my children - by blood or adoption - shall have a share in whatever I shall leave behind as inheritance for they all need it and are my and, of course, I am who I am today because my wife was included in her family inheritance against the culture of the day. Imagine that your wife had some share in her family patrimony! Would it make you better or worse? We would lose nothing, people of God, if we had everyone taking a share of the family inheritance: your wife brings hers into your union and your sister takes hers to her matrimonial home. In the end, no one loses anything but fairness and justice are established. No matter what noise you make, Mr Lover boy, if you do not say NO to the unjust exclusion of the female child in the sharing of family inheritance, you are but a noisy cymbal, a clanging gong with too much noise and meaninglessness. If we claim we are equal, our excluding women from the family inheritance makes a mockery of that claim. ... Traditionally - in Africa and other parts of the world - women are not entitled to right of inheritance particularly property of their male parents or husbands. Infact, a married woman was herself considered her husbands property and can be inherited by any of his siblings or close relations as the case may be. However, when her mother dies, she is entitled to some of the mothers property which were basically clothings, cooking utensils and their likes. And these items were shared based on seniority, and with the sisters of the deceased. What a tradition! From where did we get it? We may call our women great pet-names, sweet and aromatic romance-names, we may decorate them with our best gender friendly adjectives, but whatever we call them, if we still exclude them from the right to family inheritance (patrimony) by action or indifference, we will only qualify as good actors of imbalanced scripts. What is the difference between a man and a woman? The one was created by God and the other by man? The one urinates while standing and the other squatting? The one becomes pregnant and the other becomes a father? The one lives on bended knees (prayers) while the other on raised shoulders (empty pride)? The one leaves the fathers house and becomes anothers family member (wife) while the other remains and welcomes a family member from another family (husband)? But we hear that the three God-heads said: Let us make man in our own image: male and female He created them. He made no distinction between the man and woman in expressing his love. Even in her share of the curse, He did not mention that she would have no part in the family inheritance. So from where did we get this discriminatory tradition of excluding women from family inheritance? The Jews? Are we jews? We really need to look at this issue in our generation. Do you know that if a woman is married and lives with her husband without a child or with only female children until his death, the family of the husband will appropriate everything her deceased husband left behind to themselves and leave the widow and children helpless, hopeless and vulnerable? Such is the wickedness of this unjust discrimination! In part 12 sub-titled Female Inheritance, of a paper entitled Women in Islam Versus Women in the Judaeo-Christian Tradition: The Myth and The Reality Sherif Abdel Azim, Ph.D., wrote the following which I find a bit insightful in this discussion: One of the most important differences between the Quran and the Bible is their attitude towards female inheritance of the property of a deceased relative. The Biblical attitude has been succinctly described by Rabbi Epstein: The continuous and unbroken tradition since the Biblical days gives the female members of the household, wife and daughters, no right of succession to the family estate. In the more primitive scheme of succession, the female members of the family were considered part of the estate and as remote from the legal personality of an heir as the slave. Whereas by Mosaic enactment the daughters were admitted to succession in the event of no male issue remained(ing), the wife was not recognized as heir even in such conditions. Why were the female members of the family considered part of the family estate? Rabbi Epstein has the answer: They are owned --before marriage, by the father; after marriage, by the husband. The Biblical rules of inheritance are outlined in Numbers 27:1-11. A wife is given no share in her husbands estate, while he is her first heir, even before her sons. A daughter can inherit only if no male heirs exist. A mother is not an heir at all while the father is. Widows and daughters, in case male children remained, were at the mercy of the male heirs for provision. That is why widows and orphan girls were among the most destitute members of the Jewish society. Christianity has followed suit for a long time. Both the ecclesiastical and civil laws of Christendom barred daughters from sharing with their brothers in the fathers patrimony. Besides, wives were deprived of any inheritance rights. These iniquitous laws survived till late in the last century. Among the pagan Arabs before Islam, inheritance rights were confined exclusively to the male relatives. The Quran abolished all these unjust customs and gave all the female relatives inheritance shares: From what is left by parents and those nearest related(ives) there is a share for men and a share for women, whether the property be small or large --a determinate share (Quran 4:7). Muslim mothers, wives, daughters, and sisters had received inheritance rights thirteen hundred years before Europe recognized that these rights even existed. The division of inheritance is a vast subject with an enormous amount of details (Quran 4:7,11,12,176). The general rule is that the female share is half the males except the cases in which the mother receives equal share to that of the father. This general rule if taken in isolation from other legislations concerning men and women may seem unfair. In order to understand the rationale behind this rule, one must take into account the fact that the financial obligations of men in Islam far exceed those of women. A bridegroom must provide his bride with a marriage gift. This gift becomes her exclusive property and remains so even if she is later divorced. The bride is under no obligation to present any gifts to her groom. Moreover, the Muslim husband is charged with the maintenance of his wife and children. The wife, on the other hand, is not obliged to help him in this regard. Her property and earnings are for her use alone except what she may voluntarily offer her husband. Besides, one has to realize that Islam vehemently advocates family life. It strongly encourages youth to get married, discourages divorce, and does not regard celibacy as a virtue. Therefore, in a truly Islamic society, family life is the norm and single life is the rare exception. That is, almost all marriage-aged women and men are married in an Islamic society. In light of these facts, one would appreciate that Muslim men, in general, have greater financial burdens than Muslim women and thus inheritance rules are meant to offset this imbalance so that the society lives free of all gender or class wars. After a simple comparison between the financial rights and duties of Muslim women, one British Muslim woman has concluded that Islam has treated women not only fairly but generously. My sister did not ask my father to give up a female sperm that made her female, she did not. She just happens to be female and God is the one responsible for that and it is good. The same applies to me and my brothers. So why the disparity in sharing what belongs to the same man we both call father? Are women less human than men? Now, whatever it is we say in reply, we obviously treat them as if they were. Should this be the case? It is up to us to meditate upon. But come to think of it: why the unfairness in sharing what is not anyones in particular (it is our fathers or so, so why the unfair sharing?)? We must wait until we have our own before we apply our sharing formulae.
Posted on: Wed, 10 Sep 2014 11:31:16 +0000
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