Here the free Muslim women were ordered to observe wearing a...

Here the free Muslim women were ordered to observe wearing a complete Islamic veil in order to be recognized from the maid servants and do not give the wicked persons a pretext to cause trouble. It is evident that the concept of this statement is not this that the wicked persons had the right of causing trouble for the maid servants, but the purpose is that the Muslim women should take the pretext from the mischievous persons.

Another aim of it is that the Muslim women might not be careless or heedless in wearing their veil. There are some women who are so careless that, in the meantime that they have veils, they are so disrespectful and ill-mannered that some parts of their bodies are often visible, and this state attracts the attention of the mischievous persons to them. The philologists and commentators have introduced some meanings for the Arabic word /jilbab/ : 1- The first is /milhafah/ (chadur).

It is a long cloth which is longer than scarf and covers the head, neck, and the chest. 2- The second is /maqna‘ah/ and /xamar/ (scarf). 3- The third meaning is ‘a wide shirt’.[^2] Apparently these meanings are different but their average concept is that: it covers the body. By the way this Arabic word is pronounced in two ways: /jilbab/ and /jalbab/.

But it mostly seems that the objective meaning of it is a cover which is longer than a scarf and shorter than a chadur, (a mantle), as the writer of Lisan-ul-‘Arab has said. And the purpose of the Arabic term /yudnin/ (draw close) is that women make the veil close to their own body so that it justly protect them, not in a manner that now and then it goes aside and their body becomes manifest. In other words, it simply means that they must arrange their clothes properly.

Some have tried to use this sentence in the sense of covering the face, too, but there is no indication to this meaning in it, and few commentators believe that covering the face is inside the concept of the verse. However, it is understood from this verse that the ordinance of Hijab (veil) for free women had been sent down before that time, but some women simply were not careful of it, the above verse emphasizes that they must observe it carefully.