and neither the father nor the mother remains entrusted with safeguarding her. Experience has shown that whatever people take turns guarding is lost. As the common proverb says, “A pot shared by two cooks will not turn out well.”

Moreover, choosing either parent weakens the other’s desire to care for and protect her, so neither the father nor the mother remains fully committed to safeguarding her. The male is not like the female, as the wife of ‘Imrān said:

“My Lord, I have vowed to You what is in my womb.”

“I have given birth to a female.”

“The male is not like the female. I have named her Mary, and I seek Your protection for her and her offspring from Satan, the accursed.”

“Her Lord graciously accepted her, caused her to grow up in goodness, and entrusted her to the care of Zechariah. Whenever Zechariah entered the sanctuary to visit her”—up to His words—“You were not with them when they cast their pens to determine which of them would care for Mary.”

Even Mary needed someone to take responsibility for her and bring her up, and they hastened to undertake her care. How much more, then, do other women need this! Experience establishes that a woman needs a degree of safeguarding and protection that a boy does not need. Whatever affords her greater concealment and protection is better for her. Hence, the clothing prescribed for her covers her, and women who wear men’s clothing are cursed. He said to Umm Salamah concerning her headwrap:

“Wrap it once, not twice.”

This was narrated by Abū Dāwūd and others. He also said in an authentic hadith:

“There are two groups among the people of Hell from my community whom I have not yet seen: women who are clothed yet naked, who stray and lead others astray, with heads like the humps of Bactrian camels—they will neither enter Paradise nor smell its fragrance; and men carrying whips like cattle’s tails, with which they beat the servants of Allah.”