CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER SEVEN

HUSBAND AND WIFE

Section Three

The Character of the Husband

From the first pages of the book we have been stressing again and again that the head of the family is the man, the husband. Those groups who see women as eternally oppressed may well be offended by this repetition. For propaganda and agitation have pushed out of people's minds, especially young people's minds, the idea that a woman should be in obedience to a man. Now Uzbek girls, too, have aggressively begun to raise an outcry: “No one is master over a woman's freedom; you are restricting women's rights!” It has become difficult to call women to good upbringing and to speak to them of manners and morals. Women have fallen into a state where they cannot tell where their benefit lies and where their harm. In their minds an image has formed of the husband as the wife's servant, a genie who fulfills all her wishes. The husband rushes about day and night to please the wife, while madam wife merely enjoys it, and from time to time she may even start a quarrel, take the husband to court and have him locked up for a few days. On social media all sorts of news comes out day and night about wives who have suffered oppression; some declare solidarity, saying, “Don't stay silent, don't keep quiet”; from every pulpit and shelf, sermons ring out ceaselessly about the “sanctity” and “inviolability” of women. While not a word is said about a woman's duty and responsibility, the husband's duty and responsibility are drummed in again and again. Yet the matter is extremely delicate. How can the problems of husband and wife be solved only by the judge's bench and the sword of the verdict?! There is no way; an approach of this kind leads to husband and wife drifting apart from each other; the category of wives who cannot stand a husband, who live independently without a husband, who set conditions for a husband, is growing, and the number — the count — of women without families is rising day by day. In almost every workplace you meet such women; an age of “tolerance” has also dawned in which no one is surprised by those who have passed forty without marrying. The truth that a husband is not merely a material and physical partner has left people's thoughts; it has been forgotten what an important place a husband holds in a woman's spiritual and moral life, in her mental and emotional balance. People have closed their eyes to what a huge shield the very existence of a husband is for a woman, and no one is interested any longer in the fact that a woman without a husband falls into a spiritually forlorn and pitiable state. That is why people have appeared who cry out, “What is a husband needed for?” Yet the husband is, first of all, the companion of a woman's soul; and a wife is not a mere object but a companion who gives the husband spiritual and emotional balance! Why is it not mentioned that husband and wife find tranquility (sakinah) and peace through marriage? Why does it not come to mind that after marriage husband and wife suddenly feel serenity?! Once the notion that one must obey one's husband was completely removed from women's minds, and once young men were no longer taught that they are the head of the family, a class of men with a woman's nature, unable to manage a family, took shape. Their main characteristics are these: they do not work and look to the wife's hand; they hand over what they earn to the wife; sick of the wife's shrewishness, they have washed their hands of everything; they live in fear of the wife's blackmail and her complaints to law enforcement; when a man wants to divorce his wife, cases are now common in which the wife's side comes like an army and goes as far as physically attacking the husband's side while considering itself blameless; on top of that, most courts rule in women's favor; women immediately use their children as weapons and put them on social media; no one is interested in how the doubling of alimony in the law becomes a double burden for the man and how it affects his life and psyche; there are a great many men who tremble at the very word “wife,” and those who have developed heart disease from their wives' quarrels. And still, in this situation, all the family experts preach only about protecting women; women are not called to patience and fortitude; no one demands that a man be a man either; on the contrary, it is drummed in with great effort that he must go along with the wife's way and look to her heart.

As a result, men and women have split into two — on both sides estrangement from one another can be seen. Men and wives seem to be turning into enemies. These situations are not natural; rather, they are the first signs of extremely dangerous social tragedies. For the girls who are growing up have no notion of a man's spiritual superiority; young men have no upbringing or understanding of responsibility and leadership; the family they build tomorrow will be a family with no connection to the Uzbek mentality; in a family built supposedly on the equality of the two sides — that is, one in which the superiority of neither the wife nor the husband is ensured — there will never be family serenity; the family will consist of unmarried relations before marriage, theatrical weddings, months of poison called honeymoon, and then a series of events full of nervousness. If the husband wants a divorce, the law mercilessly loads obligations onto him; the woman, in the status of victim, inflicts as much oppression and injustice on the husband as she likes; as a result of the divorce, everything the husband has earned is registered for the wife as jointly acquired property without any hardship on her part, and large alimony and maternity payments are assigned. The family that the next generation — that is, the children of today's children — will build will be no different at all from the families of the West and Turkey today; perhaps the number of men who do not wish to marry and of women who do not wish to take a husband will grow beyond measure; a great number of unmarried men, living as bachelors, perhaps satisfying their natural needs with some bedmate or other, will become the norm. As a result, children without parents and a huge number of abortions will surprise no one. Speaking of values will seem ridiculous; if you say a wife should obey her husband, it will be judged as the Middle Ages, feudalism; perhaps there will even be those who grab you by the collar, saying you are going against the law and against freedom. Likewise, instead of regarding motherhood as the highest happiness, wives will openly say that motherhood is a burden: “I have no time left for myself, I have a child; I have two, three children — my life is spent only looking after them”; they regard caring for a child and showing him affection as a boundless tragedy; this base selfishness seems natural to them, and in this case no advice will be of any use to a wife of such a nature and such a belief. One truth is clear: a woman was created weak and submissive by nature. Inside almost every woman lives a dependent and helpless one. A woman's overstepping bounds and going beyond limits comes from the man's spiritual strength being insufficient. If a man does not have unchanging convictions, life standards and rock-solid values, any submissive woman will turn into a disobedient wolf under his hand. But if a man is spiritually robust, strong in soul and mature in intellect, if in family matters he has values that are steadfast and just, grounded in mercy and generosity, and if he does not shrink from living faithful to these values, then even a dragon of a wife will become gentle with him and surrender. If a man does not work on his own character and does not form a perfect character, he turns into a specimen who is depressed, who drinks and who complains. As a result, it is as if two women, or two half-men, are living in the family — a rag of a man and a mannish wife. That is why we have decided in this section to dwell earnestly and comprehensively on the character of the man.

To be continued

Akrom MALIK