the Exception of Hudaybiyyah

You know, when, when Rasulullah signed the treaty of Hudaybiyah, one of the conditions was that any Muslims in Mecca who accepted Islam and came to Medina, made Hijra to Medina, the Muslims would have to return them to the Quraysh, to the Meccans, to the Kufar. But there was one exception and that was women. If any women embraced Islam in Mecca and made their way to Medina, they would not be returned even if they were married. The understanding was that their marriages were over the moment they embraced Islam. It wasn't the Hijra that nullified the marriage.

It was their embracing of Islam. And so the the Muslims in Medina would pay back the mahr to whoever their husband was and say, she's not yours anymore, and we're not gonna return her. Treaty or no treaty, the women are not gonna be returned to Makkah, but the men were to be returned. This is just a sort of an example of a difference between men and women and how Islam deals with that difference, that men have a certain capability and a certain capacity that enables them to deal with difficulty and hardship and struggle and challenge. Because look at what happened with the men who were to be returned to Mecca.

Abu Jandal, Abu Bisir. They weren't returned to Mecca. They were supposed to be returned to Mecca, and they fled. And they set out on their own, and they made camp in the mountains. And every time someone was supposed to be returned to Mecca, a man was supposed to be returned to Mecca, they would go and join Abu Jantal and Abu Basir, and they would attack the caravans of Quraysh.

They would attack the caravans of Mecca from where they were in the mountains until finally, the Quraysh came to Rasulullah and said, you know that one part in the treaty where you're supposed to return all of the people who embrace Islam and make Hijra to Medina, you're supposed to return them to us, let's just nullify that part of the treaty because it was becoming too costly for them. But imagine if women had not been excluded from that condition and women had been returned to Makkah, would they have been able to do what Abu Jandel did and what Abu Bakr did and what all of those men did? No. Because they are more vulnerable, because they are not as capable, because they will suffer. Men have options that women don't have, not just because of their physical capability, but because they have a mental and emotional and psychological and spiritual strength for facing adversity that women simply don't have.

And I'm not saying women don't have it at all, but not on the scale or the scope or the depth that men do. So men were supposed to be returned, but men have options. And they set out and they made their own way until finally they got that part of the treaty nullified. This is the of Allah and it highlights something about the difference between men and women. It is not about money.

It's not about education. It's not about career. It's about a core innate quality that men have, that women do not have to the degree that men have it, which is what makes men invaluable and is what makes men. So I think all of all of these red pillars and Tomassain, they genuinely don't understand what it is about men that makes them men. They don't understand what it is that makes men great.

They don't understand what it is that makes men invaluable to women, that makes men invaluable to their families. They think it's just their social status, their income, their wealth, whatever. It's not. It's who they are as men. It's their character.

It's their strength of character. It's their fortitude. It's the capacities and capabilities that they have that women don't. Regardless of whether or not he has a job, regardless of whether or not he has social status, regardless of whether or not he's good looking, if he's a good man and he's a good Muslim and he's pious and he's got and developed all of those characteristics of masculinity, not all of these superficial things. You can't learn about masculinity from people who don't even understand what it means.

You can't learn about how to be a better man by people who don't even understand what makes a man great, who think that it's all external sources of value, like money or what other people think of him. This has nothing to do with what makes a man great, what makes a man high value, what makes a man valuable at all.