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Surah Al-Baqarah enjoins upon us that whenever we
deal in loans, we should state it in writing and
have two men to witness it. Further on it says: If
we do not have two men, then make a man and two
women as witnesses. It raises the following
question:
(i)
Why does it necessitate two women in place of one man?
The Quran itself explains why should there be two women.
That if one of them gets confused or becomes perplexed, and
errs or forgets, the other one would remind here. The verse
reads as follows:
O you who believe! when you deal with each other in
contracting a debt for a fixed time, then write it down; and
let ascribe write it down between you with fairness; and the
scribe should not refuse to write as Allah has taught him,
so he should write; and let him who owes the debt dictate,
and he should be careful of (his duty to) Allah, his Lord,
and not diminish anything from it; but if he who owes the
debt is unsound in understanding,or weak, or (if) he is not
able to dictate himself, let his guardian dictate with
fairness; and call in to witness from among your men two
witnesses; but if there are not two men, then one man
and two women from among those whom you choose to be
witnesses, so that if one of the two gets confused
and errs or forgets, the second of the two may remind the
other; ...[2:282]
There are three points worth noting in the above verse:
1.
This verse is about loan dealings (however, the principle of
two witnesses may equally be applicable to other
situations).
2.
The priority is to seek two men as witnesses and do not
bother women to be witnesses, since Quran sees a different
role for women than men in a society, due to their
biological and psychological differences as compared to men.
However, IF two men are not avaiable, women should be asked
to bear witness.
3.
The purpose of the second woman is to remind the first one
IF the first one gets confused and errs or forgets
something.
This raises another question:
Why has it been said, particularly about women, that if one
is confused and errs then the other would remind her?
Quran had in view societies in which women were brought up
in adornments and who in matters of dispute could not make
themselves clear [43:18]. This still applies to many
societies in today's world. The second woman is only to
prompt the first one IF the first one gets confused and errs
or forgets something. If the first one does not get confused
and does not err or forget something, there is no need of
the second woman's witness, although the second would remain
present at the time of witness (just to be on the safe
side).
In
short, it is not the case that one man's witness is equal to
two women's witness but one man's witness is equal to one
woman's witness, however, there should be another woman
present along with a woman witness, just to prompt her IF
she gets confused and errs or forgets something.
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