وَاسْتَشْهِدُوا شَهِيدَيْنِ مِنْ رِجَالِكُمْ فَإِنْ لَمْ يَكُونَا رَجُلَيْنِ فَرَجُلٌ وَامْرَأَتَانِ مِمَّنْ تَرْضَوْنَ مِنَ الشُّهَدَاءِ أَنْ تَضِلَّ إِحْدَاهُمَا فَتُذَكِّرَ إِحْدَاهُمَا الْأُخْرَى

Get two of your men as witnesses. But if two men are not available, then get a man and two women agreeable to you as witnesses, so that if one of them makes a mistake, the other can remind her

However, this principle is not applied in all cases.

This is specific to business contracts as the beginning of the verse indicates. Since women in Muslim society generally stay at home and men work outside the home, they tend not to be that familiar with business dealings and as such they may forget some of the details as the verse explains.

This consideration may seem quaint in the West where women have been a part of the work force for much of the 20th century. Women entered the work force as a product of the need for them in the society and the munitions factories during the two World Wars. Millions of men in their prime were sent overseas to fight and their jobs had to be filled by women. Once the wars ended, many refused to return to their homes and the feminist movement was born.

Eventually, many women came to look at fulfillment in the work place and not at home. Even if her job was only that of a secretary, harassed by her boss, smiling sheepishly to keep her job, she felt it was better than being stuck at home cooking, washing dishes, changing diapers and preparing bottles of milk. Many Western women became familiar with business dealings, so the previously mentioned considerations would seem to them irrelevant.

However, even in America, the vast majority of women are housewives, spending most of their lives in their homes, while their husbands work and bring home the bread.