His aim is that the proposal should not be on the initiative of one side only...

His aim is that the proposal should not be on the initiative of one side only, so that the phrase “taking a woman in marriage”, and always consider it the duty of a man to ask the hand of a woman in marriage, we will be lowering the status of women and treating her as a purchasable article. It is a man’s instinct to make the approach and ask, and a woman’s, instinct to be a source of attraction and act with self-restraint: Incidentally, this very error is one of the most serious ones.

It is at the root of the proposal for the annulment of dower (mahr) and maintenance of the wife (nafaqah), so we shall fully discuss it with the subject of mahr and nafaqah in its proper place. From time immemorial man has approached woman with his proposal and has requested conjugality from her. This has been the greatest of factors in safe-guarding the prestige and honor of women. Nature has created man a means of approach, love and solicitation and woman a source of attraction and being loved.

Nature has imbued woman with the disposition of a flower and made man the nightingale, woman the lamp and man the moth. This is one of the wise schemes and plans of creation. Man is instinctively disposed to seek and ask, and woman is instinctively disposed to display herself. The tenderness of her body thus finds its compensation in comparison with the strength of man.

It is contrary to the respect and honor of a woman to run after a man and woo him, while for a man it is manly that he should approach and solicit a woman for this purpose even if he gets a reply in the negative. In that case he will ask one woman after another until he meets a woman who gives him her consent.

While for a woman, who aspires to be the object of affection, the beloved, the adored one, to submit to the heart of a man who will govern her existence, it is repugnant for her to invite a man to be her spouse, and, if it happens that her request is turned down, to go in search of another man.

William James, the well-known American philosopher, is of the opinion that the delicate self-control of women is not instinctive but rather that the daughters of Eve, in their long history, have learnt that their honor and prestige do not lie in going after a man and in making themselves commonplace, but in keeping themselves aloof beyond the reach of man; women have learnt this lesson over the long span of history, and they have passed this knowledge on to their daughters.

This is not the case with human being only.