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Fatwa CenterA woman dying due to womb-cancer; a martyr?
Question
salam aleikum sheikh..i would like to know if dying from one sickness, like in my case can be cancer in utuerus...is it like to die in jihad??i have read that because women cant make jihad beause we have small children and so on that die from sickness will still take us to jennah insha allah???
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 
is His slave and Messenger.
Martyrdom in the cause of Allaah The Almighty is not restricted to men only, so a woman may also attain martyrdom. Besides, there are martyrs who are considered as such in the Hereafter only and there are martyrs who are considered martyrs in both this worldly life and in the Hereafter. An-Nawawi 
said in his book entitled Al-Majmoo’, “The ruling of martyrdom is confirmed in regard to what we have mentioned for a man and a woman, a slave and a child, a righteous person and a dissolute person.”
For more benefit, please refer to Fataawa 137353, 137306, 123881 and 88945.
The fact that there is no Jihaad for a woman, meaning that she is not obliged to partake in Jihaad, does not mean that she should not go out for Jihaad. Indeed, the wives of the Companions 
used to go out in order to treat the injured and provide water to the thirsty people, so if one of them was killed [while doing so] she was considered a martyr.
With the term ‘martyrs of the Hereafter’, we mean the people who will be given the reward of martyrdom, like the victim of an abdominal ailment, a drowned person, or a woman who dies while giving birth and so forth.
A woman who has cancer in her womb may be included in the term ‘victim of an abdominal ailment’ and she may be considered among the martyrs of the Hereafter.
An-Nawawi said while interpreting the Hadeeth reported by Imaam Muslim “The victim of an abdominal ailment is a person who has a disease in his abdomen, which is diarrhea; Al-Qaadhi said, 'It was said: ‘It is the person who has dropsy and whose abdomen is swollen.’ It was also said, ‘It is the person who suffers from pain in his abdomen.’ It was also said, ‘He is the person who dies due to any kind of disease in his abdomen.’ ”
For more benefit on the seven kinds of martyrs, please refer to Fatwa 15027.
Allaah Knows best.
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