Women’s land ownership in Australia has been historically limited, despite their significant contributions to agriculture. This inequality is particularly evident in the context of inheriting family farms. In contrast, Islamic laws have traditionally recognized and protected women’s land ownership rights, granting them specific economic freedoms.
✍| By Ms. soghra Ashouri
Phys news agency reported that despite playing a significant role in agriculture, women in Australia are often deprived of owning agricultural land. When it comes to inheriting the family farm, daughters, mothers, and daughters-in-law are often overlooked. New data shows that Australian women only inherit 10% of family farms, while Australian women play the most prominent role in agriculture.
Islamic Inheritance Laws
You may have heard many times that in Islam, men inherit twice as much as women from their father’s estate, or that a woman inherits one-quarter of her husband’s estate if there are no children, and one-eighth if there are children. You may have wondered why women should not inherit equally with men and ultimately felt a sense of injustice from the apparent inequality in the inheritance share of women and men in Islam.
This feeling may be somewhat alleviated by examining other countries and their situations. For example, the news about Australian women reports that despite their active participation in agriculture, they have no share in its ownership, and this is not uncommon.
Islam’s Role in Empowering Women
The truth is that this was the case even before the advent of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). In many different nations, it was common for women not to inherit from their families. Sometimes, a woman was even inherited like a commodity by others. However, with the advent of Islam, a woman’s human personality was revived through divine command to the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) in various stages and continuously.
One of the stages of the revival of women’s personality in Islam was granting women the right to ownership. Women had long been deprived of their agency, and Islam restored this status to them and granted them the economic rights of a human being, one aspect of which is “inheritance“. Other aspects include “alimony“, “mahr“, and “ownership of the property, assets, and income that she earns”.
Economic Agency of Women in Islam
It took a long time for this female agency to be established and recognized by a society dominated by patriarchy. But today, this issue has become so normal and acceptable in Islamic societies that their only problem is the inequality in the inheritance share between brothers and sisters.
This is while the economic agency of women in the family is not a temporary and stagnant matter that is limited to the division of inheritance, but rather a fluid and permanent matter that is also reflected in discussions about alimony, housing, household goods, the comfort of women, mahr, etc.
Hidden Truths Behind Divine Laws
Certainly, there are hidden truths behind divine laws that curious and sharp-eyed humans have not been able to understand.
However, by reading what happens in different societies regarding women’s economic rights and the issue of inheritance, it can be a good indicator of the realities that have occurred in different contemporary societies in relation to women, so that the blackouts that have occurred cannot cause frustration and isolation among Muslim women.