A. S. (Aleppo) A soft, distinctive personality, given to brooding and at times misunderstood; she loves beautiful things and everything splendid and gleaming. She has her hours of sadness — cafardeux — and makes life complicated with imaginings. A marriage attended by difficulty. A life with some calm in it, and long.
A. J. (Beirut) A personality that follows its whims, yet sober and constructive at bottom. Would that she were more supple and more accommodating. A will in need of taming, for a notable success in the future despite its heavy frown. You must be patient, for haste does you much harm.
B. A. S. Kh. (Jerusalem) A very orderly and methodical character, distinguished by a positive spirit that is always delving into the essences of people and of things; a touch of philosophy and of poetry. Intelligence, fidelity; she loves clarity, light, and justice. Devoted to principles and to the following fundamental theories: all the things whose desiring you master can carry you far, toward a flourishing future.
H. M. F. (Jerusalem) An easy, practical character, very alert, accompanied by a mark of masculine nervousness which has served her well until now, so that it has become more fitting to channel it into a positive, fruitful vitality. Much surrounded and much loved. You can be the cause of concord or of discord. You will marry a high official belonging to a foreign family, and it will most likely take place fourteen months from December 24.
S. D. (Beirut) An independent temperament, and not free of weakness. Your withdrawal into yourself has none of the suppleness proper to your years that would make you more attractive and encourage the best intentions. Look soon for a very pleasant surprise... but beware, when it comes, of displaying your happiness with a great deal of noise.
Note: We shall publish the rest of the answers in the coming issue.
nation; rather it is for me to lift up my nation and my country with a great strength which I draw from the life of the Prophet (may God bless him and grant him peace), whose nation's conquests stretched to the risings and the settings of the sun through patience, steadfastness, faith, and strength of conviction — and without my seeking any personal end.
Here is the representative of The Woman's Voice surprising me — while I am busy with my students, explaining certain points to them — with this question:
What are your feelings on the Prophet's Birthday? What influence did woman have in the life of the Prophet, and what was her station with him?
I was startled out of what I was doing, and my thoughts and feelings passed over to the veneration of moments that were a dividing line against ignorance and an eloquent lesson in the bearing of pains and the facing of hardships and dangers for the spreading of peace.
The birth of the Arab Prophet was an hour that proclaimed the close of one age and the opening of another! A brilliant light that shone forth in the midst of a barren desert, lighting the plains and flooding the universe, scattering the darknesses of error and lifting the film from people's eyes, that idolatry and sin might appear in their two ugliest forms!
A clamorous, troubled life that knew no stability! An age in which the strong preyed upon the weak — and through its expanses spread the preachers of justice, enjoining the good and forbidding the wrong!
Faces bowed and brows submitted to an unlettered man who came with clear proofs, before whose splendor stood helpless... the giants among the great; an orphan, poor, upheld by the hand of divine power, to strike at the hands of tyrannical oppressors and to take the side of the weak and the wretched!
A faithful savior who came to lift the buried infant girl from beneath the dust and to establish her station beside men, blessing her with the words: "And among His signs is that He created for you, of yourselves, mates that you might dwell with them in quiet, and He set between you love and mercy." What, then, after this,
should my feeling be at the birth of the lord of the messengers and the seal of the prophets? God's blessings upon him, again and again — you in whose life, in all its stages, woman had an important part.
Here is Muhammad, the orphan child, cradled by "Baraka," who watches over his upbringing and surrounds him with her tenderness and her affection, to fill a void that orphanhood had left; and she continues so until divine providence delivers him into the arms of the noblest of women and the best of them, Khadija bint Khuwaylid. At her side he feels calm and reassurance, hearing within himself the echo of an inner voice calling to him: "You were created to carry a great message." So he takes refuge in the cave of Hira, worshipping his Lord there and receiving the revelation for the reform of his people, while she, behind him, awaits him with food, breathes strength and resolve into his soul, and fills his heart with hope and faith! The struggle wears him down, and he finds in Aisha's youth, the sweetness of her talk, and the delicacy of her character the best solace of his later years — and what a pupil, who preserved his teachings and comprehended his book! And here he is breathing his last, his head in her lap, saying, his tongue faltering and his speech breaking:
"God... God... in the matter of women: they are as wards in your hands; you have taken them in the trust of God." He said this, and his pure soul departed.
It is influence and station enough for woman with him, that mentioning her and commending her to men's care was the last thing he uttered (peace and blessings of God be upon him), and that her womanly inspiration was his greatest encourager in the spreading of his religion. And how should I define her station with him — he who made of his religion a blessed world renaissance whose foundation is the cooperation of man and woman and their mutual support?
At the very time when minds in Europe were in turmoil over fixing her place in the social body, and a decree was issued by the Council of Mâcon that woman was created to serve man, the voice of Muhammad rose, honoring and exalting, and said:
"Women are but the full sisters of men."
Thus we see that Islam ennobled woman and gave her such a station as the most advanced of states grant her.