Abdur Rahman ibn Yusuf Mangera – Practical Steps for a Healthy Marriage
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Bismillah al Rahman al Rahim
Al hamdu Lillahi Rabbil Alameen wa salatu salam ala UD mursaleen who
are the early he was on behalf of arco a seldom at the Sleeman,
Cathy Yan Li AMI Dean,
Amma bad. We're gathered here today to discuss some aspects
about marriage, marriage, the discussion about marriage, there
are so many different things
that can be happening in a marriage that it's very difficult
to cover everything.
And every single human being is unique. Every single human being
is unique. And
despite every single human being unique when they come together,
when a husband and wife comes together,
there are then going to be very unique situations.
So what may work in a particular marriage may not necessarily work
in another marriage.
But there are a few core ingredients.
And some core points, which you can say that once a person is
married, that they need to focus on, generally, which are supposed
to be the important points to help contribute to a positive marriage.
Key elements basically general principles, they have a positive
impact on a marriage, we can say that there are four of these
points. The first point is character, and religious
commitment, because we're talking about a Muslim marriage here. So
character or lock, conduct, and religious commitment. This is the
first point number two, companionship.
The relationship between a husband and wife, the companionship is
extremely important that each one is a companion for the other.
And that's why in many languages, they actually use the term
companion for a wife in order to they say Rafi kya, hai art,
your companion for your life, essentially.
Number three social skills and communication, a very essential
ingredient.
Sometimes there's no problem, but it's just the means of
communication, social skills of how to deal with somebody how to
react to somebody.
And number four, an internal attitude of mercy and compassion,
attitude of mercy and compassion. So these are four key elements,
we'll try to look at each one of them briefly, inshallah.
The first one
is character and religious commitment.
If a person is generally vulgar in their speech,
if a person is generally very mean and nasty in the way they speak
things, or they say things or the way they act,
when you're doing that with friends, or class people or
colleagues,
you a person would have already noticed that or should have
noticed that if they're not blaming other people all the time.
So when a person gets married, and you're supposed to be with the
person with your husband and wife 24 hours a day, sometimes or at
least, you know, at very vulnerable times throughout the
day, if the character
the character is very important.
Because if a person is nasty, weird, they say strange things,
they say vulgar things, insulting things, and they don't think much
of it. You know, when we deal with students in when we're teaching
students, sometimes you have a particular student who always
says certain insulting things to other students. When that student
is called by the teacher, or the head teacher, the principal, they
still have an attitude.
And it's not because they're trying to be mean, it's because
they've had friends. They've lived too long, they've been too long
with certain friends who always speak like that in a very,
in a very rude way. They don't even know they're being rude
because that's the way they speak to their friends all the time.
And it's acceptable among their friends to be rude like this.
But now, it doesn't work like that with other people. It works only
within your little gangsta circle, or within your own group or club
or friend circle. But when you go outside of that, it looks it's
totally unusual, abnormal, wrong, and it seems just wrong. So
if a wife hears a husband speaking like this, she's gonna think he's
being rude. He may not be being rude, but
If it's going to be seem like he's being rude. And likewise, if the
wife is like that husband is going to feel like that. So we have to
really think about this. Then there are just some general
etiquette, about the way you do things, saying thank you,
showing gratitude, pray, praising someone
being patient, saying sorry, I know a marriage that broke up
because one of the partners, one of the couples, they could not
apologize.
It was, it was like it was impossible for them to open, they
would never apologize. Even if they accepted, they all
understood, they were wrong, they could not apologize.
That's very bad character.
So that's why there there are several texts. There's one by
Sheikh Abdul Fattah called Islamic conduct, mean edible Islam, and
it's been translated. And that's really good. There's another one,
which is called a double ma shallot by Monash already Tonry.
Then there's path to perfection by Maulana masuleh. Han, then there's
a double sock by Imam, Shah, Ronnie, some of these iron
English, others are in Arabic or in order to write, but you need to
read a book on martial arts
give you a simple example.
Somebody when they get out of their car, they close their door
with a bang.
Now from a hierarchy perspective, that's bad.
Because that just shows that you're going over the limit. a
HELOC is what we have to understand is that a HELOC and
character is where you go above or below the balance that which is
should be considered to be balanced and equilibrium, you're
going beyond that, or you're falling short of that. So to shut
the door very loudly, or hard is over the top.
Now, this is just showing one issue, but then they would be
doing the same thing everywhere.
So a clock and character are very important. Otherwise, because
you're constantly living with somebody so that o'clock, we have
to improve our luck. And we have to recognize we have a problem.
Otherwise, I mean, I'm not even talking about extreme greed,
extreme desire, extreme anger, person gets angry very quickly,
they're going to suffer in their marriage.
You can't exercise that kind of anger in your marriage.
One of the ways to figure out how if we have an imbalance is to go
move out of our own circle, and go and stay with other people for a
while.
And you will then start noticing that
what the differences, because sometimes we become immune to
certain types of character, because everybody around us is
like that as well. When you go into a different circle, for like,
you know, several days, then you start seeing that they do things
differently. And they find it very surprising when I do something in
my way.
So these are a few things about character. It's a personal
development that has to take place, otherwise the person is
going to suffer in their marriage. Now, if a person if a couple are
already together, and they want to develop the personal development,
then it's now it's a good idea for them to try to do it together. So
one of the ways to do that it'd be to maybe go and take a course
together to go and take an Islamic course together, like for example,
this one or others, that helps them both to kind of reflect on
themselves on their spouse. And get up maybe do prayer together at
home like the hedge of prayer together, make doors together, it
will inshallah create a bond within them.
The second point is that the second point is of companionship.
What does that mean?
The spouse has to be the best friend
of their spouse, the best friend.
You may have had best friends before marriage.
A best friend what is the best friend I mean? That's another
issue that has to be what's the best friend best friend is
somebody who you share generally all your secrets with who know you
better than anybody else, who you're willing to do so much for
more than anybody else. Now once a person gets married, and if they
still have a best friend and their husband or wife is not their best
friend. Or if not even if it's at least not even equal to a
restaurant, they have to be better than the restaurant. Their best
friends. Then you're going to suffer because your priorities
your allegiance. Right, which side you who you're going to listen to
more if your friend wants to do something but your wife doesn't
want you know
that time genuinely wants to do something else, where you're going
to give sacrifices. That's why companionship best friend,
intimate companion has to be your husband or wife.
Not to say you have to drop all of your friends.
But your friends can't be closer to you than your husband or wife.
That's a recipe for disaster.
Generally, when a person gets married at the beginning, during
the honeymoon period,
at the beginning of this marriage,
the love is supposed to start, and the longing for each other to come
about is generally natural, because it's something fresh and
new.
Right? It's a new experience.
There's a euphoria. It's an exciting phase.
And people are experiencing butterflies, if you want to call
it that, right to give the romantic idea.
That could take a few weeks for some people, and then it's over.
For some people, it's a few months. And for some people, it's
a few years, if they're very lucky. That's what you call the
initial romantic period.
Now, again, here, if you are a person who is hard to please, then
you're going to find it tough here, your spouse is going to have
to fight very hard, she may not know or he may not know that
you're very hard to please. Or if a person gets bored very easily.
If a person gets bored very easily, then that's another
challenge. If they always need new thrills, they're always looking
for the next thrill.
They can't sustain themselves with one thing, then that's a
challenge.
For example, there's one couple that I was dealing with.
They
the husband was a bit of a volatile kind of character.
A bit spontaneous.
They got married,
and he loved his football.
Sometimes football becomes a greater love than your spouse,
anybody like that here who loves their football more than more than
their spouse.
Apparently they were on their honeymoon in another country. I
think they went to Turkey for their honeymoon. And there was a
high profile football match that was taking place. It happened to
be I can't remember what the teams were but it was a very high
profile one.
Now, this is like one of the first several nights with the wife
evenings. And there's a football match on the in a hotel.
So the television in their hotel room wasn't working. So at least
if it was working, they would have both set and she would have had to
sit through. But it wasn't working for some reason. So he asked
permission for his wife to go into the lobby to watch the match. she
reluctantly accepted. She didn't want to mess it up in the
beginning of the marriage.
She didn't want to sour sour things up already. He came back at
2am.
Long after the
match was over. The match may have been over 1112 He came back at 2am
telling her how after the match, he remained behind giving dower to
the people. Mashallah.
To the other men who are there sitting watching, he was giving
them Dawa afterwards. Now is that a time to give Daro?
That God knows what he was really doing? Right? What he thought he
was giving Dawa to. Now this became a source of ill feeling and
a thorn.
Right from that stage, the wife is going to remember that.
She's going to make certain judgments about you.
Right, the football is more beloved than even after football,
talking to people. Personally, I can't even understand why he did
that. They boggles my mind. Right? From my own experience, that why
would somebody do that.
But people are different. There's different types of people.
This is a time when a spouse is supposed to be getting to know
each other.
But at that time, he's not very sensitive. And he does something
which is unusual. Eventually, they their marriage did not work out. I
guess that was a sign of things to come. After the honeymoon period,
after when it becomes more normal. Then the reality sets in and the
grind of normal life day to day life hits.
And after now, you still have to maintain the communication between
the spouses,
lifelong friends, it requires obviously a lot of efforts.
This is now when other couples fail. The initial period when it's
all fresh and new and exciting is good. But afterwards, it kind of
gets boring for some people spending quality time together.
Engaging in some kind of entertainment together people need
entertainment. So Jen
Really, if they're going to do entertainment separately, a guy
gets married, and he does his honeymoon and then two weeks later
he's off for a holiday with his friends. The Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam said that in Hadith Allah without until we the
everything with which a man amuses himself is vain, except three
things meaning, if you're going to amuse yourself in anything,
generally, there may not be any benefit to it unless you're doing
it for proper recreation, you just want to, you've just just want to
relax for a while. But if you just go and getting obsessed, and
addicted to amusement, then that's a problem. But he says that there
is actually three things which are completely halal. And you probably
be even rewarded for doing those entertainments. One of them is a
man's training of his horse, because that's related to the
whole concept of getting your horse ready, so that it's ready
for jihad, etc. Okay, so we could, I mean, there would have to be a
modern understanding of this, but that's not our focus, right now.
Number two, though, is his playing with his wife.
The problem is I was I was talking to his two men, saying that when
you're entertaining yourself with your wife playing things together,
enjoying each other, right, and you can take that wherever you
want. That is all halal, rewarding,
because that's a relationship that you have to foster. And by doing
things, entertaining between you and playing with each other, that
is wonderful.
And the third thing he said, was shooting with his bow and arrow.
So everything, there's a reason for each one of these things
because there's a benefit that comes from them. There's numerous
things that Prophet sallallahu Sallam did that we know some of
the things we don't know. But there's a few things that we do
know where the prophet saw some engaged in light hearted
entertainment with his spouses. Once for example, a group of Abbey
Simeons Ethiopians, they were demonstrating a particular type of
play a show with their spears,
in the province of Allah Azza masjid, so you know that if this
is the masjid, the person's room was here, if that's the Qiblah was
here, so
he stood with a shot of the Allahu anha through the curtain, watching
this play, she had her chin on his shoulder, so she was watching from
his shoulder. Now the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam asked,
have you seen enough? And she had seen enough she wasn't. But she
said, I just wanted to see how long he'd be willing to stand
there for me. So she said, No, I haven't. So then he stood for
longer.
Right to watch it even though he may have been bored, or he may
have not been interested as much. He did it for her.
Now, you know, that is a promise awesome is a person who doesn't
waste his time.
But here, he did it for his wife.
Then there's a famous story that they raced at least twice in their
life, they raced. Once he beat her. She beat him first. The
second time he beat her in a race. I mean, having, I think once I
raced with my wife just for this so nice, and let's have a race.
Right? Spending time and doing things together for the husband
and wife that they both enjoy helps to foster love and
friendship. Right. So none of them should entertain on a particular
thing, which the other one hates. And you forced them to do that.
She tried to think of some things that they can both do together.
I mean, what are some of the ideas you could take on a new hobby
together?
Right, a new hobby together, for example, whatever that may be. You
could read something together. Right? You could cook a meal
together. You could bake something together, you can play a board
game, a halal board game like Scrabble.
Right?
Anybody played with Scrabble? Scrabble is kind of boring for a
lot of people, but it teaches you words and a lot of people enjoy
it. Right?
You could follow a series of, of lectures, like a series on you
know, on online, for example, as well, if you don't go to the
course itself, you can go on a hike.
You can just show each other romantic gestures,
making time for intimacy, you know,
focus on focus on intimacy. So there's many, many ways I mean,
these are just some ideas. I'm sure you can give me more ideas,
many different ways of spouses that they can spend time bonding
and strengthening their relationship.
At the same time, though, they should not become so possessive of
one another.
Because that's not healthy either. You still got a life to live. So
you can't get so possessive. While the husband or wife should be
their best friend. This doesn't mean that they have to be your
only friend. Because that's going to be stifling. If the wife thinks
the husband is her only
A friend, then he can't do anything else because she's gonna
want him on his site on her site all the time.
That's very detrimental, he should be allowed to go and do his stuff
as well.
And she should be allowed to have her little side hobbies and
entertain her guests and, and that as well.
So
it can't be controlling it possessiveness, this, this
relationship of being best friend should not become so possessive,
that you become controlling.
And without realizing you could become controlling.
In fact, you may be controlling your spouse and you won't know it.
So you have to think about that.
You know, some of us when they hear these things, they think
that's not me.
But
you have to critically assess yourself.
Respect their space, the other friendships, and the other hobbies
as long as it's halal.
If the other hobbies is dealing drugs, or doing something else
that's wrong, then then you need to do something about that. But
otherwise, if they've got a halal relation, halal hobby, then you
should support it. Even if you're not interested, you should let
them do it, support it, show an interest in it, encourage them in
it, that's good.
And what you have to remember is that a husband wife can never
suffice one another 100%.
Because humans are social creatures, you can't just have
your husband and wife, you have to have more than that. So it's
healthy, for them to have a healthy hobby. For example, if
you've got your wife into baking cakes,
or making something else or doing something that's hella less good,
because at least she can occupy her mind, because she won't be
working all day, for example, you may be working all day earning a
living, but she's going to she might get bored at home, she has
to also feel a sense of fulfillment. So these are just
some things that you can consider. Spouses should be very of allowing
their job to take over their lives to such an extent that you don't
spend any time with your husband and wife, with your with your
spouse.
Now, there are certain times though, that if you're working for
a company, you have your own business or some other hobby, that
sometimes you just need extra time, there's two weeks, you know,
because it's a eat period, Ramadan, period, Christmas period
or something like that, where there's going to have be no time.
So then you need to understand that as well. That, okay, he's
going to be very busy, this is a busy period. These are just
practical things, right? These are just practical things that we
overlook sometimes. Because, for example, for women, they should
remember that ultimately, the husband is working on his career
to not only for himself, but to provide for her and their family.
And this is obviously an indirect expression of His love.
Otherwise, do you want a husband who doesn't work and who's just
survive trying to survive on handouts, begging people?
That's why Allah subhanho wa Taala says in the Quran, why is she
ruhuna Bill ma roof? What is she ruhuna Bill Maher roof, which
means and live with them in kindness.
My roof can be kindness, my roof can also mean according to
convention.
Right? Allow them to do the things that the normal healthy
conventions allow. Don't be so possessive, that they need to be
just yours, but allow it to happen in a organic way. Now, you can
obviously spend time on your career and then let your house go
up in flames.
That's also wrong. There's extremes in this case, she
similarly, she is also be considered that when she becomes a
mother. Now there's a competition. The child should not be afraid his
child as well. But it becomes like a competition. And they feel that
they need to focus all their attention on the child. Caring for
babies can be very overwhelming, especially if it's your first baby
and you're a bit of a delicate person and you haven't had any
experience. And maybe you've got nobody to help you like you don't
have your parents close by or in the same house. Sometimes that
could seem very difficult. But you're more likely to have a
husband who is going to be helpful and supportive. If you take steps
at that time to ensure that he does not feel forgotten or
replaced by your infant. That is a very important point. When you
have your first child, you should never feel like you should make
sure that your husband doesn't rely no you're going to be tired.
You're going to be you know trying to recuperate, but you cannot make
allow your husband to feel that way that he is no longer
important. Making time to maintain your intimate relationship with
your husband is especially especially important in this
regard. We'll move on to the social skills. This is the third
important factor. In fact this is probably the same
single most important factor
that needs that is needed to make a marriage work, social skills.
Many people get married without giving any thought to reading up
on him or improving the way they communicate, communication.
How do you tell people how you feel? How do you tell people what
you want through communication. And that communication has to be
appropriate convincing
for it to, for it to work, human relationships are very complex.
And there's obviously many
skills that are needed to navigate them successfully. And for some
people, it comes naturally. But for a lot of people, it doesn't
come naturally. Some people are very natural communicators, very
good at communicating. But some people aren't.
You know, they have to explain things in 10 ways to be able to be
understood sometimes.
For example, if you want to compare this to driving a car,
right?
It's possible that if somebody tells you the theory of how to
drive a car that you put your key in, you put your leg on foot on
the pedal, and then you turn it, and then you put it into gear, if
it's, you know, depending on whether it's manual, or they you
can get a theory, you can try it a few times, and you may even be
able to get from point A to B without an accident, you may be
able to do that. But without the theoretical rules, knowledge of
the way the car works, and the rules of the road.
Right. Even if you made it from point A to B safely, once, you're
not always going to make it safely.
Because all you've learned to do is just how to operate the car and
a basic level, you have no idea beyond that you have no idea about
the laws and regulations and what you do in certain circumstances.
So the
social skills that are required for marriage are very similar. And
people don't even think about this, how many people even think
about this.
We all think so in the same way that you think you can learn the
basics of driving cars just drive the car, we all think that we know
how to communicate with people because we do it on a daily basis.
On a daily basis, we communicate with people we get by.
But there is so much more to be learned regarding the best method
of speaking, and dealing with others from a psychological
perspective.
And a lot of it is not immediately obvious.
Now, our times in particular this generation, this particular
century that we're living in, and probably the future, it's even
more complicated now.
Because of the overwhelming influence of social media, why?
Why are we why are we blaming social media for because
that is warping, the understanding of what it really means to be a
friend.
Before everybody knew what it meant to be a friend, it was a
quite a universal idea. But this century has introduced to us a new
idea of how to be a friend, you can be a Facebook friend and never
have met the person in your life. And if you do meet the person, you
will be awkward with him even though you're so good.
Online with them
to different things completely.
So your friend is your spouse is not someone you know from a
WhatsApp group.
Or someone who's posts or tweets you like.
They are a real physical person that you interact with daily.
So if for the last 10 years, you've been on WhatsApp, and
Facebook and all of these things, and then suddenly you get married,
and you've only had proper friends on those means, I mean how you can
deal with somebody on a personal level. Because when it's on so on
WhatsApp, you are hiding behind a screen. They can't tell what how
you are really.
So these are real people you're going to be dealing with. And
you'd have to be very intimate personal relationship with your
spouse more than any other person. That's why social skills are very
important to think about social skills are very important. Social
skills obviously covers a vast range of principles and
techniques. And we can't talk about that here because that will
take a whole day. That's a whole subject on its own. What we want
to talk about are just a few things. First and foremost.
There is a difference between men and women, okay. There's a
difference between men and women. They are not alike. It doesn't
matter who tells you what at school or in whatever subject or
what feminists may tell you that we're all the same. We're not the
same. All right, there are clear differences. Anybody who thinks
otherwise is crazy. I mean, there are difference between men and
women. This that's just obvious.
There are I'm not saying one
is worse than the other way, just saying we're different. Okay. I
mean, we can agree to that.
And then obviously, we also come from different temperaments and
communication styles. That there is a very good book about, which
is called Men are from Mars, and women are from Venus by John Gray.
And that's kind of like a landmark book that goes to explain to men,
that women think differently and do things differently. And he
tells women, that men are very different. And really, it's an eye
opener. For the people who've read it. It's an eye opener, because
they would always think, Why doesn't he get me? Why doesn't she
understand me? Well, because you're different, and she's
different. And you're both different. You think differently.
A huge proportion of day to day problems and arguments that arise
in a marriage, the result of miscommunication.
The other one spouse just didn't understand what the other one is
intending or what they want.
We have to try to understand where the other person is coming from
what's in their mind, what are they really trying to say? What is
their objective? What do they want accomplished? You see, it's very
different how men rationalize things. And it's very different
how women rationalize things, and the conclusions from each of them
can be very different. So try to really step into your spouse's
shoes.
I don't mean physically, but you know what I mean?
Don't close your mind and become obstinate and stubborn?
I am right, it's obvious, that don't have that attitude. Why
can't they see that? Why can't you understand that? Help them
understand it?
Yeah, we have to try to very hard to really listen and to empathize.
You have to remember that a good marriage is not the one where they
don't argue.
A good marriage is not necessarily one that they never argue. In
fact, far from it. That kind of magic marriage may actually
indicate that this is an abusive or neglectful situation where they
just can't bother with anybody or one is controlling.
Abusive, and the one can't say anything. So there's no arguments.
Right? Or that they just can't bother anymore. So just because
you don't have arguments doesn't mean it's a healthy marriage,
you're gonna have arguments, and that's fine to have arguments. A
good marriage is in where you have healthy arguments and
communication.
There are things you're gonna have to come to terms with, with both.
And for that you need a healthy argument, give and take.
Does anybody have an issue with trying to make their spouse
understand something they don't understand?
No, sometimes, right? So one of the ways now I don't use this
because Alhamdulillah I understand my spouse, and if I don't, by this
time in 20 years, I've 21 years, I've, I know when to say okay, no,
tell me what you mean. I don't understand that. No, explain that
again. All right. So I've learned to deal with that. But one
strategy that some people find useful is what they call
mirroring.
Right, mirroring what they say this, you can call that reflective
listening. So if the partner is telling you something, right, your
spouse is telling you something, and you know that they're not
always they don't always have too much clarity, or you may
misunderstand. So what you do is, you say what you understand, after
they've said, that this is what I think this is what I want. So then
you say, Oh, so you mean X, Y and Zed? And they'll say yes. Do you
understand what Mirroring is now, so it works with people, I mean,
these things, it works with even people outside, you know, if
you're working with somebody, and there's a constant with your boss,
for example, or with a worker, they're not understanding you,
maybe they speak a different language, maybe they're just
different. So what you do is you once they've said what they want
to say, then you say, Oh, so you mean this, this and this, and
they'll say, No, not in this. But yes, in this. And that's how
slowly slowly, you can get validated. What they've said
becomes validated. It's called mirroring, if you need to use
that, you can use that it can avoid a lot of misunderstandings.
Initially, when you do that a few times, then you will be able to
figure out what they say what they mean, because you will learn that
you then you will have to do it less and less. But otherwise,
you're going to be constantly frustrated, because you feel that
this is what they said. And they said something else. So they meant
something else.
Number two, it's also important because sometimes there will be
issues that you want to bring up. But you have to find the right
time to bring it up. There's a right time for communication.
tactfully. You have to approach it.
So you can't do it. For example, when somebody's getting ready for
work. You can't do it. If you've got children in front of the
children that would be the wrong place to do it. Because people
feel more self conscious.
You know, children and then she
Children, obviously are very sensitive to any tension between
their parents anyway. So this could be harming the children.
Similarly, if you know that one of the spouses is very tired or
stressed at that point, don't bring it up, then that's the wrong
time to bring it up when they're tired or stressed at that
particular point. What are the main issues here that number three
is how to deal with criticism,
how to undertake criticism, and how to deal with criticism.
Because clearly, if you want to improve someone, there's going to
have to be some criticism, positive criticism, not negative
criticism. We're all human beings, and we are all flawed. And we will
inevitably make some mistakes. Every one of us, even after 20
years of marriage will make a mistake. Because we're human
beings, we make mistakes all the time.
That's why nobody's perfect. And both should be willing to accept
criticism from the other. But they just have to learn to
constructively criticize in an appropriate manner. If somebody is
arrogant.
And they cannot take criticism. Or if you're too shy to speak your
mind. And you end up bottling all of your bitterness and resentment
inside,
then this is going to be a recipe for disaster, because you can't
bottle it up forever.
It's going to explode on the bottling up is different from
tolerating, and dealing with something, you can't go and
criticize everything that happens. You can't tell somebody or for
every little thing that happens. You have to pick your battles. But
you can't never or you can't always never say every anything
and bottled it up until it becomes make you angry, angry. And then
one day you will just say it in a way that's just going to destroy
the whole thing.
That's like criticism is very important in every relationship,
but it needs to be just constructive, not negative and
contentious. negative criticism hardly ever works. Right? The
Prophet sallallahu some used positive criticism, right? For
example, when Abdullah and Omar Radi Allahu Anhu.
The profits or loss I'm just mentioned to have solid the Allahu
anha, who is the daughter of Homer or the sister of Abdullah
abnormal? So he said that what an excellent man Abdullah is like
your brother is such an excellent man. If only he could perform the
extra Tahajjud prayer at night.
So instead of going into why don't you do that your prayer at night,
said Oh, it'd be so such a wonderful thing if you could even
do that. Right. So after that, Abdullah, that really hits him,
and he would sleep very little at night. And he would, he would
pray. So anyway, the next point, then, is that you have to learn to
pick your battles, right, you can't pick every battle. You can't
fight for everything. It can't be 100%, perfect. If you're looking
for 100% Perfection, just know you will never get it because you
yourself aren't even 100% Perfect. You know what I mean? There's
nobody perfect, there has to be a give and take, you have to learn
to pick your battles, right. And obviously, this leads to the whole
concept of nagging. in inverted commas nagging. When you want to
pick every battle, it means nagging,
nagging, which means that goes on Anon, what the other person does,
then they like they dislike it, and then they learn to close their
ears to it. They don't like it, but they learned to close the ears
to it. So it's not being effective. That's why you can't
always nag somebody about everything, they always put up a
wall, then that's just human reaction to something. That's how
they deal with it. So the other thing you have to remember is that
it's virtually impossible to completely change another person,
virtually impossible. To change another person. You can't have
them 100% the way you'd like them to be. You know, before you get
married, you have this maybe ideal spouse, this is how I want them to
be never happens that way.
But you can be satisfied with what you have. Allah can make you
satisfied with what you have. That's the important part here.
Let me talk about something else now, which is a bit controversial,
but it's unnecessary here. The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam said to men, he is audiences men, so he's talking to
men and he is referring to women, right? Because married men are
married to women. Treat your women well treat women well.
For they are created from a rib.
And the most crooked part of parts of the rib is the upper part. If
you try to straighten it, you will break it. But if you leave it, it
will remain crooked, crooked. So treat women well.
So what does that mean?
The main thrust of this hadith, right, the main Maxim, a main
objective and message about this hadith is that you must treat your
women with gentleness that's what the Prophet SAW
Some is saying, right if we removed all contentious part of
our Well, what do you mean by being created from a rib and rib
being crooked? What are you talking about? If we just ignore
that for the moment because the message of it is that you need to
treat your women well, that's the message okay? So you should treat
your women with gentleness and you need to treat them well and you
need to abandon any hope of making them perfect and straight in your
mind. They're going to remain crooked.
You must exercise beautiful patience in dealing with them
because Allah says we're into Spiro highroller come wala Hua
photo Rahim. But that you be patient is better for you. Allah
is Most forgiving, very merciful.
So you're either going to exercise patience in avoiding marriage
altogether. If you think that you can't deal with crookedness, avoid
marriage altogether.
So difficult.
But if you do marry then in your interaction with them, you must
also exercise patience, because patience is going to be part of
your life. Whether you get married or you don't get married, you have
to be patient.
What is it now now that we've understood the main objective of
the Hadith? What does it now mean about creating being created from
a rib? Right?
There could be three reasons for this. It could be more reasons,
but I've come up with three reasons from what I've studied.
Number one being created from a rib can literally refer to the
origin since our mother Eve alayhis. Salam how are they a
Salam was created from the highest rubover wa salam, as numerous
narrations tafazzin, etc. Tell us I mean, you know, it says, Allah
mentions that in the Quran as well that how it is done was created
from other monies around the rib isn't mentioned in the Quran, as
mentioned in the Hadith, right. But it's mentioned that he was
created, she was created from him in the Quran. So she was created
from the highest group of other Malays, Sudan, which happened to
be also the most crooked one.
Now, if you take a rib, you will probably break it. Before you can
straighten it. It's impossible to straighten if you try to straight
and he'll break it.
Furthermore, the second point here is that why are the ribs even
there? Why do we have ribs? It's a cage if have you ever seen ribs,
right? If you see a cross section, the skeleton of a rib section, you
will actually see that they
partially enclose and protect the chest cavity. With his many vital
organs, they're the heart and the lungs, they literally protect the
heart and the lungs.
And they are curved on both sides of our bodies, both the front and
the back to create a cage to provide the maximum protection
they could not have been straight,
it would have been a blemish a fault. If they were straight, they
curved and that's what makes us look perfect our torso, etcetera,
right. So they could not have been straight. And this is obviously a
sign of Allah's protection, perfection.
The Crooked rib then
is the whole crooked idea here, the promise or some is just using
from the whole biology of the of the rib. Right. But then there's
another meaning as well, which is the third point that
well, this is still the second point about the protection that a
woman just like she's being created from the rib which is used
to protect the the essential organs. A woman has all the
characteristics required to perform her function of protecting
her family and children.
So if a man tries to change a woman to be like him,
she would not be able to perform her function, which is mercy and
protection of her loved ones.
So you can't make your wife like you.
Right?
It can also be taken metaphorically and figuratively
in that women from a man's perspective, this is not whether
this is the reality or not but from the way the man views it or
the way generally men we I don't I don't necessarily view it like
this. But the way men generally view it is that they think women
are
you can tell me if this is wrong, if the way you or if there's
something else. They think that women are very emotional. They're
too chatty. Right mean to talk too much sometimes.
They never forget things. Right? They're difficult to please
unreasonable,
and they can't park their cars properly.
Right.
Among other things, that when you get men together in a room, they
would rightly or wrongly banter about. So we're not saying this is
the reality but this is what men generally when you get men and
they're talking
about the word this is what they do. I don't do this, right? I
honestly don't do that. But I'm saying a lot of men do that. These
are the criticisms I have for when women get together to have other
criticisms women.
So men, the prophets also me saying some men, if this is how
you view your women,
if in your perspective, this is how women are, then remember that
that's their nature.
Get over it, and look at their positives so that you can enjoy
them. Rather than being living a miserable life with this
complaint.
Treat them with kindness, gentleness, and persevere against
their crooked, so called crookedness in your mind, for you
have no other option. You're stuck with them. Right? She will do
things that make no sense to you just accept it. Because that's how
women are.
Does it make sense? So he's talking about from a man's
perspective, he's not saying that's how women are necessarily.
He's saying that's how you think so well, you better deal with it.
Now.
I'm going to give you the Hadith again with commentary. So I'm
going to mention the words of the province of Assam, but with a
commentary to explain now, based on what I just explained, the
province that license words.
When I go like this, it means these are the words that province
are seldom, a woman is created from a rib and cannot remain in
one state. This is what the President said in another Hadith,
meaning she will not always be how you want her to be, but will waver
between sometimes being thankful and grateful to sometimes being
ungrateful and showing ingratitude that's going to happen to her.
Right? Obedience and disobedience, can contentment and Diskant
someday you're gonna say I'm very happy with you. And someone will
say you've never done this for me.
So if you want to enjoy her, the most awesome is saying, enjoy her
despite her crookedness
since it cannot leave her again. And if you do try to straighten
her, by exceeding the limits, by using force, and you do not excuse
her ways and overlook her deficiencies, again vase, you will
end up breaking her and breaking her means divorcing her and of the
Hadith from similarly for women, it's not always one sided.
Similarly for women, if they're going to try to straighten out the
perceived flaws of their husband, whether by brute force, or by
nagging him constantly, right? Drop by drop nagging every day,
that's going to be extremely detrimental to their relationship
as well. What you have to remember is that change comes from within,
you can't force somebody to change, you have to put the right
make the right environment, you have to make the right points to
try to get them to make one the change from themselves. That's why
a loving and compassionate attitude with Taqwa is going to
obviously prove much more effective than being critical
repeating oneself. That's one of the best ways to win people over.
I shudder the Allahu anha. She was very she was very savvy in the way
she used to when the Prophet said the Lawson's love over to over
write.
Once in a hadith she says that the prophets Allah's Messenger said to
me, that I know when you're pleased with me, and I know when
you're angry with me, he figured her out. He says, I know when
you're angry with me, and I know when you're pleased with me.
I said, How do you know that? He said, When you're pleased with me,
then you generally say no by the Lord of Mohamed, like when you're
speaking and you swear an oath you say no, by the Lord of Muhammad.
But when you're angry with me, you say no, by the Lord of Ibrahim. So
you take my name out.
So now, do you know what she said? She was very young, she was less
than eight. She was only 18 When the process and passed away, and
she got married when she was nine. Right meaning she came to the
Paracels when she was nine. So this is in between teenage years.
She said,
Yes, but by Allah, I leave only your name.
In words, otherwise, you're in my heart.
Right?
So she confirmed that that point, her deep rooted love by reassuring
the Prophet salallahu Alaihe Salam, that it was only his name
that sometimes she left out of saying, but she was he was always
in her heart.
Allahu Akbar. I mean, that this hadith indicates to you that they
also had arguments. They also had opportunities to make one another
angry. That's why the person was saying to her, I know when you're
angry with me, and I know when you're happy with me, this is the
best of creation.
They also have healthy arguments. So what you
back to us to do. The other thing then is, when your spouse does
criticize you or make a mistake, which is bound to happen, we have
to develop the humility to be able to accept the mistake and
apologize.
That's so important. You gain more respect, when you apologize, you
don't lose it. Some people have a psychological complex that if they
apologize, they feel they're going to drop themselves. Even if 10
People tell them, you are wrong, I've dealt with a case where
the one spouse was told that they were wrong by several people that
got involved and heard the story both from his and her perspective.
And the several people that got involved, except maybe that spouse
is very close friends, because they some some spouse is very
close friends, as blind as they are, they are the biggest trouble,
they cause the biggest problems. They're not your best advisors,
but anybody else neutral, whether you ask them or whether the
husband asked him or the wife asked them, they told them that
they were wrong. What that spouse did was that she or he cut off
those people, because they weren't talking in their favor. They cut
them off.
That just shows some kind of psychological complex. That means
they need some kind of psychological help you gain more
respect when you apologize, you don't lose it because they know he
can apologize, he shows your vulnerability shows that you're
easier person to deal with.
That's why the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said that I
guarantee a house at the edge of paradise for the one who gives up
arguing even if they're right.
To avoid the argument, even if they're right, they give up the
argument, I give you a house at the edge of paradise.
And a house in the middle of paradise for one who abandons
lying, even when joking and a house in the highest part of
paradise. For one who is beautiful in their conduct, who deals with
it in the best of ways they're going to get the highest place.
And so don't think that if you apologize to defuse the situation,
and to make amends, that it's going to be wasted. No, you're
going to get things for it. To succeed in marriage, you must
learn humility. And the Prophet sallallahu sallam said that the
one who initiates the greeting is free of pride. So you know, when
you have a little problem with somebody and you feel bad with
each other, right? And then it's like, he must apologize, she must
apologize. First, she must say she must try to rectify first because
it was her problem, or his problem, the profit or loss and me
saying that the one who gives us alarm first to try to reconcile.
They're the best of the people. They're free of pride.
And this has happened several occasions, I felt I was right. And
I was like, No, this time, I'm going to make sure that she comes
to me or not me. And then when you read this hadith, when you
remember this hadith, like okay, you know what, let me I'm gonna
get some reward for this, let me do this. That's why these Hadith
really helped. You should have them on your phone somewhere.
Every time you have a contract, read the Hadith. Unless you're so
angry. No, I don't want to read them. She has no part in here. So
apologize. But another point I want to mention quickly is that do
not hold grudges. You can't afford to hold grudges with husband and
wife.
They become too heavy eventually. And they mess up your
relationship.
Some waves have a habit of holding on to small issues, keeping them
bottled up inside and allowing them to fester, there's going to
be issues just have to nip them in the bud, you have to deal with
them straightaway. And move on. Holding on to past issues will not
make you feel any better. And your husband will not even be able to
see how they are upsetting you. Like sometimes the husband may do
something or the wife may do something. And it upsets you. But
they don't know they didn't do it on purpose. You held that inside.
They don't know what's the point.
You see what I'm saying is no point.
It's very biased and unfair. Like for example, right? A husband may
have had his dinner, and he forgot to clear up the plate.
Now because of the months and months of bottling up small issues
this day when he came home and he was really tired or weird or he
just thinks he doesn't have to clean up the plate. Because some
husbands doing it like that they don't have to clean up the plate.
They don't have to pick it up.
He can come he can eat and walk away and then the servants the
wife is a servant. They think like that they don't even help
but this guy you know he was maybe in a busy or whatever. So he
didn't pick up the plate. And then she just burst out. So you never
pick up the plate and in all the previous months. You don't even
put the rubbish out. You don't do this and you don't do that.
Why didn't you mention these important points before except you
do it only when you're angry? Because when you do when you're
angry you can't do in tact
Free, you will then do it in anger, and then it will just maybe
he'll start responding. And then it doesn't work.
Finally, when it comes to communication, it's important to
be on the same wavelength with your spouse, you have to be on the
same wavelength.
Now, this can initially be difficult when you first get
married, because you're both coming from different wavelengths,
different kinds of perspectives, you have to learn to get to know
each other and balance it out. If he's the harsh one, she's the soft
one, then his harshness has to be tempered down by her softness. And
her over softness needs to be raised by, you know, by by his
efforts.
But once you get to know each other, you have to learn to mature
with one another. Especially when it comes to the issue of raising
children. This if you're on day for different wavelengths, you
will have great difficulty in bringing up your children, because
then your children will know. And they will play the spouses with
one another. They know their mother always lets them do it. And
the father doesn't or they know their father doesn't let lets them
do it and the mother doesn't, they're going to be playing you,
and you're gonna get angry with one another and your children are
going to know this.
That is one of the worst things that you can do.
You have to be on the same wavelength.
The last point then the last of the four ingredients was
compassion and mercy. Unfortunately, our climate that
we're living in right now, of consumerism, and selfishness, that
doesn't give us much room for mercy, and for selflessness,
because we learn to indulge, it's so easy nowadays to take what you
want and just throw what you don't want away and just get something
new. So that's why it's very difficult to do that in a
marriage. See, what I'm saying
is you can't do that in a, in a human relationship, we have to
really deeply invest our emotions for our spouse.
It's a give and take situation, right? With Husband wife is a give
and take situation. And the other thing that you have to realize is
that marriage is not just about ticking boxes, or fulfilling the
50 requirements, what is my right towards my wife, and what is my
right towards my husband. And that's it just these two, and
these I'm not going to do anything else never works that way. Never
works that way. Those were just fundamental things, the fuqaha.
The juris just left everything else to culture and to social
norm, social demands. So anything that is not haram, and that's
demanded, it should be fulfilled by husband and wife. That's very
important.
Let's say that you had an ideal spouse in mind, or when you got
married in with your spouse, he or she has certain flaws. I'm telling
you this from personal experience, right? You have an ideal, this is
what you wanted. But now you've got a wife, right or husband, and
they have certain flaws. What are you going to do now? You think if
you get another one, they're going to be perfect. grass is greener on
the other side, they're probably going to have this they may not
have certain problems, but then have other problems. Every human
being is like that. What are you supposed to do? This is what the
scholars tell us to do. And I guarantee you that this works.
Firstly, the hadith of Abu Huraira the Allahu Anhu. He says that the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said that Leia for men and
Minuten that a believer should not despise his wife. For if there is
any quality he dislikes, because there's certain qualities that you
dislike, there will be certainly others that he would be pleased
with. So what is he telling us to do? Focus on the positives, focus
on the good.
They will be disliked, but they will be other things. If she talks
too much. Maybe she's a very good cook, though.
Right?
If she doesn't cook so well, but maybe in every other way. She just
makes you so happy.
Intimately intimacy, whatever else. All right. Look at the
positives. Is he looking at positives, there's some people
they just very negative, they always focus on the negative. A
lot of people are like, they always look out for the negatives.
Even there's 100 positives and 20 negatives, they'll focus on the
negatives. One negative and 10 positive, they'll focus on the
negative No, they just pick it up. They're like business investors,
they just see an opportunity so they see negativity. Don't be like
a pig.
A pig when it goes into an orchard, it goes and looks for the
rubbish because they used to that be like a nightingale. When a
nightingale goes into an orchard it looks for the most beautiful
flower goes there and sings. Just positivity
helps a lot. It's not harmful at all.
Because if you're going to be constantly negative, you may
eventually end up with nobody around you because you're going to
be considered negative. Then the second thing that you do is you
read the following Dr. Robert
Na habla Naaman as Virgina with RIA Tina Kurata Aryan would your
analysis Sakina EMA O our Lord, grant us this is a Quranic dua by
the way, grant us from our spouses, and our progeny, our
children, grandchildren, etc, those that will gladden our eyes
and make us the leaders of the righteous people. So you know what
the benefit day is the other mentioned that if you keep reading
this Quranic dua, which is very powerful, slowly, slowly, Allah
and you keep focusing on the positive and not the negative, and
I tell you this, from experience that this works, Allah will either
change your spouse
to be all positive, or the negative things, you will be happy
to ignore them, they won't matter to you anymore,
they will matter to you anymore. And the positives will satisfy you
to such a degree that you will be very, you will be very happy with
them that you won't, the negatives won't bother you anymore.
And I guarantee you that this works if you if you approach this
in this way with a trust in Allah.
Because if I'm bothered by somebody who does certain things.
For example, there were there were two vegetables that I could never
eat.
I could never see myself ever eating them, I would just never
eat those vegetables. But I've started eating memories, and I'm
actually started enjoying them now.
Human beings have an ability to change. In fact, what the
psychologists will tell you about the brain is that
every 10 years, couples, every 10 years undergo a change. It's every
10 years they undergo change, you will be different when you're 40
From when you're 30.
Many, you know based on your experiences and everything like
that the last point before? Well, last point here for this point is
that
you have to start a bank balance with your spouse,
a bank balance of love,
and positivity.
And goodness. What that means is that
you have to constantly do good things
to your spouse, all right, go out of your way to do them. What
you're doing by that is in their bank balance, you are putting a
lot of good.
So when you do have a problem, they can draw from that bank
balance, because look, you know if I have a small issue, but even
whether it's accidental, or it was not done on purpose, and there was
a slight misunderstanding, and because of that it created a
slight bad feeling. Shaytan is going to try to use every
possibility to create such a bad feeling that, oh, he hates you,
she hates you, she doesn't like you, and so on and so forth, make
it worse than it is.
And there was no such reading like that. So shaytaan is going to use
that. But if you have a big bank balance of love and favors from
before, when you have this problem, what it's going to do is
that they're going to think No, he can't hate me. She can't hate me
because look, look at what she did yesterday. This is probably a you
won't allow the shaytaan to manipulate that.
And you have to remember that love is not like
brushing your teeth for two hours, one day of the week. Somebody says
you know what, you need to brush my teeth every day, twice a day,
I'm just going to Sunday, I've got time. I can't do it every day on
Sunday, I'm going to do two hours of brushing.
Instead of that what is more effective is to do two minutes
every day. That is more effective. In fact, you spoil your TV did two
hours of brushing your teeth. Right? So likewise, when it comes
to your spouse, it's not what you do once. It's not that one holiday
you took her to is not those one bunch of flowers that he bought
you Is not that wonderful dress that he bought, you know it has to
be a series of things, small, small things and they will create
the bank balance. That is amazing. That is extremely important.
So if you've deposited enough love in the bank, you can withdraw from
there during these difficult times. Without going overdrawn in
your relationship. You never want to be overdrawn in your
relationship. By having lots of love and positivity and fond
memories between you. You will realize in those difficult times
when you're mulling over an argument or trying to think of a
way to win or get back on the other that this situation is an
exception and you are generally having a good life and a happier
relationships and this will inshallah make it easier for you
to reconcile.
So that DUA and positivity and that should solve a lot of issues
in sha Allah, William Shakespeare this is what he says the beautiful
poem right in let me not to the marriage of true minds admit
impediments. It's in a sonnet number 116 He says, Love is not
love which alters when it alteration finds, or bends with
the remover to remove. Oh no, it has an ever fixed mark that looks
on Tempest and is never shaken. It is the star to every wondering
Bach, who is worse unknown, although his height be taken,
loves not times full. Those though rosy lips and cheeks within his
bending sickles compass comm love alters not with his brief hours
and weeks, but bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be
error,
and upon me proved, I never it. No, no man ever loves. Love has to
be for the long run. You can't just show love one day and then
give up the next day when you feel there's no love, but love has to
be forever.