Of course the most famous hand of a muslim woman is the hand of Fatima (the daughter of Mohammed the prophet).
the story goes as follows:
" One day Lady Fatima was cooking Halvah in a pan in the garden when suddenly the door opened and her husband the caliph Ali entered along with his new bride. Fatima was deeply grieved and dropped the wooden stirring spoon in confusion and unaware, she continued stirring the halvah with her hand. Because of the grief in her heart she never even felt the pain of her hand mixing the hot halvah. However, when her husband hurried to her side and exclaimed in surprise "What are you doing there, Fatima?" she felt her hand burning and the pain. Thus it is from that day on the hand of the Lady Fatima has been used in the Islamic world as a symbol of patience, abundance, and faithfulness, and thus it is that girls and women wearing this necklace from whose end the hands hang believe the hands of Lady Fatima will bring them good luck, abundance and patience."
And it is even in the news these days:
" "The Hand of Fatima" that many Muslims in France carry as a sign of faith is a superstitious throwback to paganism and has nothing to do with religion, according to some Islamic scholars. The image has been in the news recently with French President Jacques Chirac's call for the banning of religious symbols, including the Muslim veil for girls, in the secular state school system.The Fatima amulet is called a "Khamsa" in Algeria, from the Arabic word for five, and is seen as protection against the "evil eye." "
And one more thing about Muslim women's hands, a thought of mine, not a scholarly research:
Note that the only culture where women decorate their hands with henna as a matter of daily life (and I saw it on most women who covered themselves almost entirely in Yemen) are the women who can only show their hands (and again in the case of Yemen not even always, some women covered their eyes with a black veil and their hands were on black gloves).
