All praise is due to Allah The Almighty who exalted some women with strength of personality and therewith they surpassed peaks; and humiliated others with the opposite (weakness of personality) and therewith they hovered over mean vices. While some people are raised [by this characteristic] to the highest gardens, others laugh a little and then are cut off by fire and they go around between it and scalding water, heated to the utmost degree. The first group is promised to be rewarded as in the verse in which Allah The Exalted Says (what means): {Is the reward for good [anything] but good?} [Quran 55: 60] Indeed, there is a great difference between the two groups.
Strength of personality is a characteristic that is loved by the heart. Many aspire to attain this characteristic, but only very few achieve their desire. If strength of personality is a characteristic of perfection for men, it is for women more precious than wealth and more beautiful than beauty itself.
However, what is this characteristic? How should it be? Such a characteristic is attained when you are firm and stable like the firmly established mountains. The question is now: on what should one be firm and stable? Here is the point where disorder occurs and mistakes are made. Imagine that a girl is told that poison extends age and brings forth happiness and she, therefore, asks for a cup of poison to drink. We stop her, warn her and offer her advice. However, she picks up the cup before everyone, shows stubbornness, and drinks it. We advise her but she declines [to accept the advice] and says, "I am free." She then goes to an extreme in stubbornness, drinks more and shortly thereafter falls dead.
Is she not the one who wrongs herself?
Do we say that this state of stability and firmness means strength of personality? No, by Allah, it is not. This actually features instability and a perverted mentality. So, now we agree that not all forms of stability and firmness mean strength of personality. Strength of personality is not realized by obstinacy or argument and shouting like children. Allah The Exalted Says (what means): {Whoever desires honor [through power] - then to Allah belongs all honor.} [Quran 35: 10] Rather, strength of personality occurs when a girl or woman seeks through that firmness the highest of all wishes and desires. She is not satisfied with a price that is less than a garden in Paradise as wide as the heavens and the earth.
What a strong personality Aasiyah, the wife of Fir'awn (Pharaoh) had! Contemplate and think! Her husband was the foremost of all people in disbelieving in Allah The Almighty. Nevertheless, this did not prevent her from being one of the dearest humans to Him. There are many weak women who lose the satisfaction of their Lord for the sake of their husbands. There are many women who go to sorcerers to satisfy their husbands, commit polytheistic actions and disbelieve in what was revealed to their Prophet, Muhammad . In a Hadeeth (narration), the Prophet said: "Whoever goes to a soothsayer or diviner and believes in what he says, has disbelieved in what was revealed to Muhammad."
There are many women who wear clothes that are hateful to Allah The Almighty and they do so to satisfy their husbands. What a weak mind and what a weak personality! Look at the reward of the wisdom of Aasiyah which was made perfect by Allah The Almighty. Who determines the woman's position in this religion? Are they the secularists? Are they the dissolute women? Nay, the one who decides the woman's position is the Lord of The Worlds Who ordained this religion. However, who is that woman who deserves this honorable position by her Lord The Almighty? That is because most women are in Hell. Why? Is this because Islam wronged them? No, by Allah! Allah The Exalted Says (what means): {And Allah wronged them not, but they had been wronging themselves.} [Quran 16: 33]