In answer to the video "Scholarly Ability: Paul vs. Muhammad (PvM 2)"
The ratio of 1 man equivalent to 2 women's testimonies mentionned in 2:282 is a general advice
"so that IF one of them errs, the other can remind her".It is a conditional statement, which makes the second female a passive witness unless the primary witness is forgetful. Therefore if a women is sound and competent, then she would need no other woman to remind her of something she knew but forgot. Her single testimony becomes equal in value to that of the man. The testimony is not gender based as one expert is not sufficient for a transaction to be binding; it requires 2 men as is clear from the verse's beginning
"get two witnesses out of your men".The verse actually favors a woman witness who wouldnt automatically be dismissed for incompetence but would be supported in case of error while the single male witness would be replaced in the same case. The verse addresses the issue of financial matters and the fact is that on average, women are much less qualified than men in financial expertise, even in western societies. As well, women are almost all affected, sometimes completely debilitated by PMS symptoms during and around the times of their menstrual cycles, in their emotional-intellectual and physical capacities, all of which might potentially compromise female testimony in such a situation. To dismiss that condition as potentially affecting every single woman simply for the sake of preserving a facade of progressive thinking, is a denial of an objective reality.
The Quran doesnt deny human nature and instead approaches everyday matters realisticly and pragmaticly. It only accepts the testimony of a person affected by a psycho-emotional condition that could potentially influence the objectivity of a case, when it is a woman -hence the 2nd woman to remind her. It is clearly referring to a condition not to the presumed intellectual capacities of a woman, hence the 2nd woman's role to remind her of something she knows but was mislead into forgetting.
If what the Quran meant was that a man's testimony is equal to 2 women's, the Quran in other instances ie when a woman is accused of adultery, would be saying that one woman's testimony is equal to 4 men's because if 4 men are not brought forth then their testimony will not be valid and they will be lashed for lying 24:4. Also, in the case a husband accuses his wife of adultery without bringing forth eyewitnesses, her testimony has the same value as her husband's, contrary to the Bible where the accused wife is immidiately considered guilty by default and is made to undergo humiliating and strange rituals to prove her innocence Numbers5:11-31. Without forgetting the fact that in Jewish law, women arent even allowed to serve as witnesses in legal matters in a court of law.
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