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So coming back from NUST, lots of students wrote written questions and I got a few of them later so I'm going to read one to you.

This is written by a young lady. What is the right role of women in leadership positions in community?

For me I have been a very vocal and outgoing personality, passionate to make an impact. In my various roles I have had tons of people, centric engagement.

I someday want to be a civil servant too, but all along I have been told that leadership isn't for women.

How do I contribute if I'm made to feel small?

Here there's an organization for Islamic teaching, some name she mentions. They keep their women behind the scenes. They have no social media presence as if they have nothing good to give.

Similarly, women are told to be hidden off and away as said by and she mentions some speakers.

What do I do with my influence? I never want to use it for my own fame, etc. I avoid it.

But I am brought to positions somehow by God's will. How best can I use my ability, especially in the digital age, and when I'm fully hijabi and fully according to Islamic attire.

This is actually a renegotiation and a rethinking of some of the assumptions we have about the role of women in the Ummah.

And one of the best places we can try to understand this is in our history.

So there's two ways to answer this. First, obviously being a student of Quran, when somebody brings up an issue, I think about the Quran and I think about how would somebody who's navigated and scanned the entire book of Allah, how would they respond to this?

The second place you'd go is like the Sierra of the Prophet, Salah Salam, and say how are women in the Prophet's life? What roles were they playing, how are they participating?

The third place you'd go is we have a very vast history in Islam, right? We're not just one continent or one culture or one nation, one language.

We spend every continent and we have a rich history in every continent. How are Muslims that were committed to their religion, men and women, playing their roles in all these different places throughout history?

And if you scan all three and you, with exceptions here and there, within the Quran, for example, there is no place where women are not being given or being put in a certain kind of cage.

In the family, Allah did make men the head of the household. That is a leadership responsibility. Allah gave men, which is why they're called Qawam, caretakers.

And so they are responsible, and that's why they have to be financially responsible. So there's a leadership role there.

But then there are other places in which women are taking leadership roles, like at a very micro level, when Musa's mother lost Musa Alay Salam in the water, she also had Haroon, Haroon is the brother, but she sent the sister to go, because Haroon is the older brother, so he already exists.

But she sends the sister to go, and she takes the lead and goes, and all the way follows Musa Alay Salam to the castle, and then even recommends that they bring the mother back.

So the entire story rests on the intelligence of this little girl, who we recite about in Surat Al-Kasas.

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