Bismillah
Praise be to Allah, King of the Worlds the All Knowledgeable and prayer and peace be upon His Messenger Mohamed and all other messengers and prophets.
Insh a Allah in this post I will try to invest the blessing of being a native Aabic speaker and share how I do understand the Ayah of the dress code, however, I must say that Insh aAllah this is my personal interpretation and may Allah Forgive me if I m wrong.
In Quran, there is an Ayah that stands as basis for women to adopt a certain dress code that entails covering their heads, shoulders and front part of their garments.
The Ayah goes as follows:
“And tell the believing women to lower their gaze (from looking at forbidden things), and protect their private parts (from illegal sexual acts) and not to show off their adornment except only that which is apparent, and to draw their veils
all over Juyûbihinna and not to reveal their adornment except to their husbands, or their fathers, or their husband’s fathers, or their sons, or their husband’s sons, or their brothers or their brother’s sons, or their sister’s sons, or their (Muslim) women (i.e. their sisters in Islâm), or the (female) slaves whom their right hands possess, or old male servants who lack vigour, or small children who have no sense of feminine sex. And let them not stamp their feet so as to reveal what they hide of their adornment. And all of you beg Allâh to forgive you all, O believers, that you may be successful” (Quran 24:31)
In this Ayah, Allah used the word Khumurehin (which is the underlined red font word in the translation above) to indicate the head cover rather than using the word <i>Ghitaa e roosekum </i> which translates as head cover. How do we understand it this way?? The word khumurehin is the plural of khimar. Khimar in Arabic is the item used to cover the top of anything. For instance, in Arabic we can say khamerel aneyah, meaning cover the top of the utensil. But at the same time, the word khamer is used to convey the sense of the yeast effect on dough. In other words, when we add yeast to the dough, the yeast works as a growth factor to the dough. Therefore, to have the yeast performs the expected role and introduces the needed effect of growth, the utensil must be covered after adding the yeast to the dough.
Let us apply this on the incomparable meaningful expression of Allah. Allah Commanded women to use their khimars which would cover their heads but at the same time will allow them to attain growth of their intellectual, mental, and reasoning abilities.
Allah The All Knowing, Knew ahead that there will be a strong argument even among muslim women in some cases that Hijab as they call it is synonymous to the veil of the mind, the ability of a woman to reason and think. However, Allah Willed to tell us no, in fact covering your heads will allow u the contrary.
How is that?? When women are not abiding by the dress code, they lay more emphasis on their appearance and how to make an impact through this appearance. Even on the professional level, a woman spends much time before a formal meeting making a decision on which suit to wear, which color is more adequate for this particular gathering, which perfume shall be proper, what is the set of accessories that will go with the rest of items…etc. In this, she over uses her mind in how to make her appearance influential enough.
But Allah Wills for the Muslim woman not to be busy or dependant on her appearance. When a Muslim woman covers her head, she allows the intellectual aspect to grow just as the yeast helps dough to grow. This is what Allah Desire for us. Look to the mothers of the believers how wise they were and they were even fully covered.
Alhamdulelah Who Has Guided us for this and if it was not for Him we wouldnt have been guided.
