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What is the ruling of Islamic law regarding a wife who refuses to leave her mixed-gender workplace despite her husband's discomfort with it, and prefers her work over her marital life, claiming that it is a support for her and her daughter?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

The recommendation is to resolve the issue with wisdom and gentleness. If the husband orders his wife to leave a permissible job, and he provides for her expenses, then she must obey him, and she is not allowed to refuse. However, we advise the husband to handle the matter with wisdom and leniency. We also draw attention to the fact that not all mixing [between genders] is forbidden. Rather, it is forbidden if it involves immodest display (tabarruj), speaking in a seductive manner (khudu' bil-qawl), or private seclusion (khalwa). Therefore, we advise him to be patient in his command and to overlook what he considers an offense if the aforementioned mixing does not lead to something forbidden, especially since he previously allowed her to do this work. However, if the work leads to something forbidden, then it is not permissible to allow it.

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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