We make notification of a matter which is that many women enter the field of disparagement and appraisal (al-jarḥ wal-taʿdīl), and this is a mistake for [a number of reasons].

Firstly: It opposes the behaviour (manner, demeanour) of the righteous among the female Compnions and those who came after them. It is not known that any of these women put herself forward in disparaging and appraising [individuals]. Rather, one of them—I mean the righteous female Companions, and at the forefront of them are the Mothers of the Believers—if a man came to ask from behind the curtain, she would give him a fatwā. From these women—in addition to the Mothers of the Believers from the female Companions—was Nuṣaybah bint Kaʿb (رضي الله عنها), Umm ʿAṭiyyah and many others. Among the Tābiʿīn were ʿUmrah bin ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, the companion of ʿĀʾishah, Muʿādhah bint ʿAbd Allāh al-ʿAdawiyyah al-Baṣriyyah and Ḥafṣah bint Sīrīn.

Yes, although there are found virtuous female scholars even in later centuries, and I mention by way of example, Karīmah bint Aḥmad al-Marwadhiyyah, then al-Makkiyyah, whose kunyah was Umm al-Karam. She died single and never married. She is one of the female narrators of Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī, she narrates Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī from al-Bukhārī to the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم). They say she was a competent jurist and that four-hundred competent jurists took knowledge from her. She would sit after the morning prayer until ʿIshā, and they would take [knowledge] from her from behind a curtain.

Secondly: No matter how much strength [of knowledge] and expertise a woman has been given, she will not be able to encompass the hideouts and hiding-places of men [in these affairs]. This is extremely difficult.

Thirdly: She may subject herself to what she is unable to do, and in that lies the wrath of her men [from her household], because there is no man is found who has jealousy that would let his women go out and mix with men or make contact with men.

This is what Allāh has made easy of our answer to this issue.