First Place Winner 2015 - Dating in Islam
Dating in Islam
Hala Ayyash
Many Muslim girls are put in situations where a boy asks them on a date and they are always left to question is that if they should accept the offer or not. Many girls would automatically deny the offer but as we get older we tend to question what is really right and what is wrong. As young Muslim girls having the privilege of growing up in America with the different culture and we see all our friends having boyfriends and we ask ourselves what is right? Because all our lives we are told to try to avoid boys and all their offers but the older we get we start feeling a thousand different emotions and we want to experience new things and having a boyfriend is one of them. Being a Muslim girl in middle school doesn’t really have a great effect as it does being in high school. In high school many different school events start to come up and most of them include having dates such as prom. Everyone around you will have a prom date and you don’t want to be the only one without a date and you know it’s not right to have much interaction with boys but there comes a point where you are basically pressured to have a boyfriend or a date, your peers pressure you but the greatest pressure of all is your conscience. Yes, your conscience normally guides you to the right path but the more you think about it you start to have a different outlook on life and all the things you thought were wrong start to become right In a way, or at least you think so. Many people say yes dating in Islam is haram, its haram because you will be tempted to do haram, as it says in the Quran the weakest thing for men is sex. So let’s say a boy asked you to prom and you say yes, how will you know what his true intentions are? You just know him from school you haven’t really talked at all but you’ve heard of him. He is the smartest boy in class, captain of the basketball team, popular, and a perfect gentleman. This boy has no bad flaws at all so you think to yourself that this one night won’t hurt but you know deep down that what you’re doing is not right but it is also innocent in a way. There is a fine line in dating between what is halal and what is haram. The obvious things that are haram are all the sexual relations you can have with that boy. Every girl going into a relationship should have morals, she should know what is right and what is wrong, and most of all she needs to be smart and mature because if you go into a relationship that is taking a risk, a huge risk. Many girls accept the offer of going out because they want to seek ultimate happiness and many of us think that you can find it within other people and that is one the biggest mistakes you can ever make. Nobody should depend on anyone else but themselves for happiness. If you depend on someone else to make you happy especially a boy that can result into really painful emotional pain and you won’t be able to focus on the things that once made you happy before you gave your heart to a boy. One of the mains things in a relationship is to know the person. Before you engage into anything serious you must know the person. You need to communicate, you need to what his intentions are, and you need to take caution because as we all know boys really do take advantage of what they have. Over all if a boy asked me to prom/date I would inform him on the culture I live in and I will make him understand that going out with a Muslim girl is very different than going out with a non-Muslim girl. Once he is very aware of how an Islamic lifestyle works I will the ask him if he still wants to proceed, that way I can know what his intentions are and he can know what my intentions are instead of starting out the relationship with a lot of miscommunication and It won’t work. Many people would reject this option but everyone has a right to do what makes them happy, as long as you know what you want and that you are aware of all the risks you are taking you can do what you please even if that mean going out with a boy. Every Muslim girl should also be aware that she will be tempted to do what is haram such as all the intimate actions and she should be aware that she must not do these things because then that’s what will make a relationship haram. Every Muslim girl should also keep in mind that if decides to go into a relationship that doesn’t mean that she becomes distant with Allah. She should always keep him close in her heart because he is blessing her with this privilege. Every girl should also communicate with her parents and make sure it’s okay with them to date because if not it will cause tension with her family and family is very important so she shouldn’t do that. She just needs to be aware of her actions and always be faithful.