Umm Al-Darda is a well known companion of the Prophet Muhammed (SWT). As a young orphan child, she would pray with the men, until she came of age at which point she began to pray with her fellow women. During the 7th century, she became a prominent jurist in Damascus, Syria and a teacher of Hadith, the words and actions of the Prophet, and fiqh, or Islamic jurisprudence. As a teacher she once again returned to the the male section of the mosque, this time to give lectures. In her teachings of fiqh, she came to use a fatwa, which allowed women to pray in the same seated position as men. She is considered an important traditionist of the time, superior to all other traditionists in that same time period. In commemoration of her devotion to the study of Islam, a center for teaching Quran, hifz, and tajwid to women in Bahrain nears her name. She is quoted as saying “I’ve tried to worship Allah in every way, but I’ve never found a better one than sitting around debating with other scholars.”