Aurah vs Fashion

Before we start diving too deep into this topic of aurah versus fashion, let me give you a simple description of what exactly aurah and fashion are. Aurah comes from the Arabic language and aurah has numerous meanings such as shame, nakedness, intimate areas, humility and many more. In my opinion, aurah simply means the intimate areas of our body that should be covered by proper clothing in order to avoid being exposed to non-mahrams and if we cover ourselves accordingly, we shall be rewarded for doing a good deed. When I say ‘we’ here it actually refers to both male and female Muslims because we all know that even males have intimate areas of their bodies that shouldn’t be visible in public.

Moving on to fashion. I guess we could say fashion is the popular trends in clothing style that most people love to follow. Basically, people follow what is hot and new in fashion because they want to be up-to-date with the latest trends. We look at models and famous celebrities for inspiration to get ideas on what to wear to. I believe that if you wear anything that looks nice on you, you are fashionable! Fashion doesn’t just refer to clothing, it could also refer to hairstyles. Men and women all over the world cut their hairs according to the current hair trends.

Now that we know what aurah and fashion is, we can discuss these two topics through an Islamic perspective. As Muslims, we have certain rules and regulations that we need to abide by and perform if we want to please Allah. As I mentioned above, we need to cover our aurahs properly to prevent us from committing sin. This means that not only do our aurahs have to be covered by clothing but it has to be covered the right way. Meaning, we cannot cover our aurahs by wearing tight clothings. This is not the right method to go about it. If we do so, the shape of our curves could still be seen and others may have the capability to picture our bodies in their minds and if we let others do this, we are bringing shame to ourselves.

Most Muslims tend to forget their Islamic roots and backgrounds. They look up to Western celebrities and read Western fashion magazines instead of looking at hijabistas or Muslim fashion for fashion motivation. Some look at Kendall Jenner’s or Lucky Blue Smith’s fashion style and follow what they are wearing even though what they’re wearing is against what we believe in Islam. Some people do not care if they are committing a sin because they just want to be seen as cool and happening. But what we don’t realise is that what we are doing is very stupid.

Centuries ago the Europeans and the Westerners thought that other races besides them were uncivilized and barbaric for being naked in the wild as they were wearing multiple layers of clothing. Nowadays, it is the other way around. In our world today, we see the Europeans and the westerners wearing bikinis and going topless. But we perceive that as being civilized or being in trend. Where is the logic in that? What’s worst is that our Muslim brothers and sisters are following these trends.

My only advice to our Muslim friends is to stop conforming to other societies which are not ours. We should only imitate our Muslim fashion icons instead of Western fashion icons. There is a saying that goes like this ‘Sometimes less is more’. Well in our case, it is the opposite; more is better! So, wear what is fashionable in Muslim fashion and not only will you look fashionable, but you will also get rewarded for it.