Women are allowed to remove hair on the arms and legs
Fatwa No: 3860

Question

What is the Sharee'ah ruling on removing hair that grows on women's arms and legs? Girls and women are accustomed to periodically remove the hair of their arms and legs. It is also a custom that they remove all the body hair in the wedding night.

Answer

All perfect praise be to Allaah, the Lord of the worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah and that Muhammad, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, is His slave and Messenger.

It is permissible for women and girls to remove the hair of their arms, legs and the rest of the body, except that of the eyebrow, since the Prophet, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, did not forbid this. The original ruling is that everything is permissible unless there is proof that prohibits it.

Removing the hair of the eyebrow, however, is impermissible. The Prophet, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, cursed women who pluck eyebrows for others and those who ‎have this done for them. In a Hadeeth, the Prophet, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, said:

Allaah has cursed women who practice tattooing and those who have it done, women who pluck their eyebrows and those who ‎have it done, and women who make spaces between their teeth to beautify themselves, whereby they change the creation of Allaah. [Al-Bukhari, Muslim and others]

Allaah Knows best.

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