Man found himself alone

You know, up until the last one hundred years or so, men and women socially didn't actually interact very much. Throughout the entire history of the human race, men and women did not interact very much even within a family. Even within like, in a in a big family, if there were gatherings, the men would be in one area of the house, the women would be in another area of the house. There was a sphere for men and a sphere for women in the world and even in the home. There was a sphere for men and a sphere for women.

They didn't interact very much because they don't actually have that much in common except each other. Men have their interests. Women have their interests. Men have what they're supposed to do, and women have what they're supposed to do. And that's the way it's been for the entire history of humanity until yesterday.

So how did men prior to yesterday define their identity, define their masculinity, define what it means to be a man? Because it was not determined by women. It was not determined by what women want, what women value, what women find attractive, what women are looking for in a man. That is not how men define themselves because they didn't even interact with women that much. Women have always defined themselves to one extent or another in terms of their relationship to men, being what men want, being what men are looking for.

That's always been the case with women. It was never the case with men until very recently because women were never alone in this world. Man was alone. When Adam was created, he was alone. He was the only man.

We don't know for how long, but he experienced in that time some dramatic events. Alone, there was a time when man had to define himself in the absence of anyone else except his creator. The natural way for a man to define himself is in terms of his role vis a vis Allah. A man's way of defining himself from the beginning of man was to understand himself and his identity and his nature and his masculinity and his essence in terms of his relationship to his creator. Woman was created from and for men.

Therefore, it is with regards to her relationship to a man that she finds her identity, meaning, her purpose, her value. Man is not that way. It's a very serious mistake in the modern era for men to define themselves in any way whatsoever in terms of their relationship to women and what women want or like or are attracted to or are looking for or are satisfied with. That's never been the way we define ourselves, and it's not a way of defining ourselves that works for us. We have to define ourself according to the way man has always defined himself, which is in terms of his relationship to his creator.