Now that this has become clear, there is no conflict between Abū Dāwūd’s foregoing statement concerning the woman who plucks hair and Ibn al-Athīr’s statement in al-Nihāya: “The woman who plucks hair is one who plucks hair from her face.” This was not intended as an exclusive restriction. Rather, plucking hair from either the eyebrows or the face constitutes hair-plucking, and whoever does so is a woman who plucks hair. Al-Hāfiz likewise indicated in al-Fath that restricting hair-plucking to the eyebrows is a weak view. After mentioning the substance of what I quoted from al-Nihāya, he said (10/317):
“It is said that hair-plucking specifically means removing eyebrow hair in order to raise or even out the eyebrows.”
Abū Dāwūd said in al-Sunan: “The woman who plucks hair is . . . .”
It would have been better had he said regarding this statement of Abū Dāwūd, “Mentioning the eyebrow is not restrictive,” just as he said this regarding the face, as noted above. For construing scholars’ words according to a sound meaning is better than construing them otherwise, thereby forcing the researcher to demolish them.
In sum, what the author related from al-Nawawī—that removing facial hair is impermissible, contrary to the view of some Hanbalis—is the conclusion required by rigorous scholarly investigation. Allah is the One who grants success.
97 — (Al-Bukhārī and others narrated from Aisha, her sister Asmā’, Ibn Mas‘ūd, Ibn Umar, and Abū Huraira that “the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—cursed the woman who attaches false hair and the woman who has it attached.”) p. 88
Authentic. The hadiths of Aisha and Asmā’ will appear below. The hadith of Ibn Mas‘ūd appeared previously as no. (94), as did the hadith of Ibn Umar as no. (93). As for the hadith of Abū Huraira, it was narrated by al-Bukhārī (4/101) and Ahmad (2/339), with the wording: “Allah cursed the woman who attaches false hair and the woman who has it attached, the woman who tattoos and the woman who has herself tattooed.”
98 — (Al-Bukhārī narrated from Aisha that a young woman of the Ansār married,