Hijab vs choir garment

Osun State is in the news again.  This time around, the “rumble in the jungle” is between the Muslim Hijab and the Christian choir garment. Traditionalists, agnostics and atheists must be watching with ample glee as supposed worshippers of a God slug it out with each other over non-issues. An Osogbo High court’s judgment delivered […]

Osun State is in the news again.  This time around, the “rumble in the jungle” is between the Muslim Hijab and the Christian choir garment.
Traditionalists, agnostics and atheists must be watching with ample glee as supposed worshippers of a God slug it out with each other over non-issues.
An Osogbo High court’s judgment delivered by Justice Jide Falola recognizing the rights of Osun’s Muslim female students to wear hijab in public schools drew the battle line.  Should this judgment be a cause for any commotion? I honestly don’t think so! For the judgment merely affirmed the right of a people without denying that of any others.  Should Christian female students also wear choir garment to public school? Why not, if they are so inclined! For what is sauce for goose should also be sauce for the gander.
In point of fact, the female veil or dress code generally is not and should never a source of disagreements or controversy between Christians and Muslims.  I stand to be corrected, but pending just that, I strongly believe that female veil is a scriptural provision in both Islam and Christianity.  Need chapters and verses? I have them handy.
The single most significant verse often quoted by Muslim scholars in support of the Hijab or veil is that in surat Al-Ahzab chapter 33 V 59 where prophet Muhammad (S.A.W) was commanded by God thus: “O Prophet! Tell your wives and your daughters and the women of the believers to draw their cloaks (veils) all over their bodies.  That will be better, that they should be known (as free respectable women) so as not be annoyed. Allah is oft-forgiving, most merciful.”
Similarly, scholars of comparative studies of religion maintain that similar provisions abound in the Christians’ holy book.  For instance, the Bible reports of how Rebecca, Prophet Isaac’s wife to-be was covering herself with a veil: “…she took a veil and covered herself”-Gen 24:65.  Also, according to the New Testament, it is considered as disgraceful for a women not to veil in public as stated in I Corinthians 11:6 thus: “For if a woman will not veil herself, then she should cut off her hair, but if it is disgraceful for a woman to have her hair cut off or be shared, she should wear a veil.”
In the light of the foregoing therefore, it could safely be concluded that, as far as scriptural Islam and scriptural Christianity are concerned, the question of a woman wearing a veil is a settled one.
Any adherent of the two religions who rants and raves against wearing a veil (Hijab or choir garment) does not have any basis whatsoever in the scriptures.  In fact the spirit propelling such person is not of God but of something else.  May God keep humanity united in spite of their diversity, amen!
Hamisu Hadejia, Lokoja, Kogi State.