Female Prophets

[Seeking Allah's Mercy]

Asalamo`Alaykum Wa Rahmatullahi Wa Barakaatuh,

I'm basically trying to save contents of a PM of mine in this thread.

Question: Were there any female Prophets?

It is said that there were six female prophets, namely: hawwaa, Hajar, Sara, Umm Musa, Asiya and Maryam.

Reason:

وَأَوْحَيْنَا إِلَىٰ أُمِّ مُوسَىٰ أَنْ أَرْضِعِيهِ​

Basically, from that verse some scholars derived and concluded that the mother of Moses was a prophet because revelation was sent down to her. (wahy).

There is a difference between messengers and prophet. Men were sent down as messenger, but women were not. This is not the case with prophets. And Imam Ibn Hajr gathered evidence from other verses and narrations from the prophet and concluded that there are six female prophets.
One thing though, many scholars disagreed with this.

Following is the answer I got from another brother, who learned from his ustaadh:

Answer: Some of the scholars from the past held the view that there were female prophets, from them: Abu'l Hasan al-Ash`ari, Al-Qurtubi, Ibn Hazm etc. They quoted a number of evidences, like when Jibril descended to Maryam to give her the news about I`sa `alayhi al-salam (in Surah Maryam) and they also gave another ayah as evidence in surah al-Qasas:7, which sounds more convincing:

. . .وَأَوْحَيْنَا إِلَىٰ أُمِّ مُوسَىٰ أَنْ أَرْضِعِيهِ ۖ
"And We gave Wahy to the mother of Musa (saying) that: "Suckle him (i.e. Musa)..." "
​

The shaykh mentioned that this view is incorrect for a number of reasons. The wahy related to Umm Musa, is more like Ilham (inspiration) as opposed to Wahy (revelation) due to a number of reasons:

- Allah used the same word for the Hawariyyun (disciples) of I`sa `alayhi al-salam, when He said in Surah al-Ma'idah:111

وَإِذْ أَوْحَيْتُ إِلَى الْحَوَارِيِّينَ أَنْ آمِنُوا بِي وَبِرَسُولِي قَالُوا آمَنَّا وَاشْهَدْ بِأَنَّنَا مُسْلِمُونَ
"And when I (Allah) gave Wahy to Al-Hawarieen (the disciples) to believe in Me and My Messenger"
​

And without a doubt the disciples of I`sa were not prophets.

- The second reason is because Allah uses the same word in relation to the bee in Surah al-Nahl:68, when He said:

وَأَوْحَىٰ رَبُّكَ إِلَى النَّحْلِ أَنِ اتَّخِذِي مِنَ الْجِبَالِ بُيُوتًا وَمِنَ الشَّجَرِ وَمِمَّا يَعْرِشُونَ
And your Lord gave Wahy to the bee, saying: "Take you habitations in the mountains and in the trees and in what they erect.
​

From above the two ayat, it is clear that Wahy means Ilham (inspiration) and so this shows that there were no female prophets and further adds strength to the understanding of the following ayah:

وَمَآ أَرۡسَلۡنَا مِن قَبۡلِكَ إِلَّا رِجَالاً۬ نُّوحِىٓ إِلَيۡہِم…
"And We sent not before you [as messengers] except men to whom We gave Wahy to"
​

Secondly, a number of scholars said that there is a consensus that only men were sent as prophets. From them, al-Nawawi quoted a consensus from Imam al-Haramayn, Ibn Taymiyyah quoted a consensus from al-Qadi Abu Bakr.

Sorry about the late response.

Wassalamu `alaykum

 

[islamerica]

Waalyikum assalaam wa rahmatullaah wa Barakaatuh


a more in depth answer is available here: http://islamqa.com/en/ref/158044