Who Looks After Women With No One to Support Editted by Adil Salahi
Q. Who of a woman’s relatives should look after her? If a woman has no one to support her, or if her relatives abandon her, how is she to survive? Is she entitled in this case to be supported by the Islamic state? Can she claim support from the state in raising her young children, if she has no one to support her?
S.R. Khan
A. According to Islamic law, a woman is not required to work in order to earn her living. She is entitled to be supported by her husband or family. A man is duty bound to look after his wife, ensuring that she has a decent standard of living, in accordance with his means and with what is reasonable.
An unmarried woman or a widow is entitled to be supported by her immediate relatives, according to their degree of relation. The closer to her has more responsibility.
Thus a woman’s father should support her if he has the means to do so. Her son is required to support her as a duty. If she has no husband, father or son to look after her, then her brothers or uncles should undertake this task. However, the latter should do this even though it is not required of them as a duty in the same sense as it is required of a husband, father, or son.
If a woman has no relative who can look after her, she is entitled to be supported by the government in accordance with Islamic law. If she has young children to bring up, they also must be supported by the government. Having said this, I realize that governments in most Muslim countries may have a social security system in place, but such a system is often inadequate or cannot cope with the widespread level of poverty.
Yet if the governments in many Muslim countries would only operate the zakah system properly, it is bound to provide a good solution to the problem of poverty and look after the weaker elements in Muslim society.
The sad thing is that they do not realize this, or if they realize it, they do not want to have anything to do with it.