Ismail Kamdar – al-Adab al-Mufrad Chapter on Parents
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hamdulillahi rabbil Alameen wa Salatu was Salam ala Nabi al Karim are the early he was having asthma in Ahmedabad. So hamdulillah Welcome back to our series on of Alfred, the book of manners by Imam Al Bukhari. This is our third session for this year. In the first session, we went over the biography of Imam Al Bukhari and his works. And we became familiar with the author and the contributions that he made
to this ummah. And we said that one of his most overlooked contributions, is his book and move. Right The Book of manners Hamdulillah we are all aware of his book sahih al Bukhari, which is his masterpiece his his life's work, but he wrote over 20 books, and this is another book of his that is very important. In our second session, we did an introduction to this book, right. And in the introduction, we went over what are the core topics, we looked at one or two of the Hadees. And we looked at what was the intention of the author in putting together a book like this? Imam Al Bukhari already has his say, and in the sir he he has a book of manners. So what would be the reason why he
would publish a second book separate from that called the Book of manners.
And instead, this was to emphasize this topic that he believed this is an important topic to be studied on its own. Furthermore, he wrote this book on the most simple level, right? For the most part, this book, anyone can read it and understand it, compared to the Saheeh, which is a very high academic work that requires scholarly explanation.
So what we're going to do moving forward is each session moving forward, we'll focus on a specific theme. And we will cover all of the ideas related to that theme if we can.
And the first theme of allowable movement is the rights of parents. Right. The first theme in other move rod is the rights of parents. Now, in our book, it did not split it into the themes like that, but the commentators did, rather, the first 24 chapters in this book, deal with the parents. And these 24 chapters contain 46 narrations. So the first 46 narrations in this book is all about the parents.
So we're going to do something slightly different today, what we're going to do first is we're going to look at what does Islam say about the topic in general, then we're going to look at some of the contemporary challenges related to this topic. They are contemporary problems related to the rights of parents that we want to address, then we will read through all 46 Hadees. As, if possible, we'll try to read through all 46 of these today. Even if it's just for the baraka of learning the meaning of the Hadees, we won't go through the explanation of every single one. And after we read through all 46 Or Hadees, we will pick certain ones to go into more details about and LinkedIn back to our
primary topic.
So to begin the rights of parents
in Islam, the people who have the most rights over us, our parents, right after Allah and His messenger, the people with the most rights over us are our parents. This is something that I'm sure all of us have learned from a very young age. And you will see what the Hadees that we go through today. This is a point that Rasulullah salAllahu alayhi wasallam, he emphasizes over and over again, right that your parents are most important in this world. And in the Quran, the way it is written in the Quran, or the way it is instructed in the Quran, is Allah orphans will combine the status of the parents with the importance of Tawheed to Allah will say, worship your Lord and be kind to your
parents, that these two commandments go together. So it's a very important part of our religion, that we that we fulfill this commandment, which in Arabic is called Burel worldleading. How do we translate Burel worldleading
beruwala Then we will translate as kindness to parents. Right? kindness and respect of our parents is a lifelong duty. It's not something for children. It's a lifelong duty and many of us forget this as we get older. Right? And as we go through the Hadees, you'll see that it's, it's not for your parents lifelong. It's your lifelong duty. Meaning even if your parents passed away 20 years ago, there's still certain duties you owe them in Islam. Right. So we will go through this and you will see that it is a lifelong duty for you even if you
Parents have already passed away, they still have rights over you. Now,
the level of rights that your parents have over you depends on what phase of life you are in. Meaning the rights that parents have over small children is different from the rights they have over the adult, fully grown children. Right? It's not exactly the same. And I will divide this into three phases of life.
We can call this the circle of life, right? We all go through different phases in our life, the first phase of life growing up, your parents are raising you, this is the first phase of life. The second phase of life, you are an adult, your parents are adults, right? The third phase of life, you are now getting older, your parents are going really old, and you need to take care of them. And then eventually, you become the old one, people have to take care of your well blesses you with a long life. But this is the circle of life that everyone goes through. And when you understand this, then you understand your relationship between children and parents goes through three phases. The
first is children, as long as they are living with their parents, historically, this would be until puberty. Nowadays, you can go all the way to 30. Right? People don't grow up much these days. But as long as they're living with their parents, living under the parents house parents rules, right? They're at this age specifically for children.
You're your duty towards your parents is one of obedience. It's not just respect. It's not just kindness, it's obedience. Mom and dad make the rules of the house, children obey the rules of the house. Right? So at that age is obedience to the parents. The second phase, your child grows up, they move out, they have their own spouse, their own children, their own job, their own life. At this phase, your duty towards your parents is one of respect and kindness and maintaining good relations.
It's not one of blind obedience. And it's important to point this out because there is a
there is a problem in some parts of the Indian Muslim community, where some parents exploit this, right? Where they tell the children you have to obey me for life to such an extent that they tell their son, I want you to divorce your wife, you have to obey me, you have to divorce your wife, Islam says you must obey me. And so they will emotionally blackmail the son into divorcing his wife. Now, they may emotionally blackmail the son into, you know, giving them a lot of money, even though they don't need it. But they will use this concept of obedience to make life miserable for them, for their children and, and their daughter in law son in laws, they are people who do this in our
community. And so it's important to point out that once your child is grown up and not in your house anymore, you do not have that level of authority over them. You can't command your adult son to have a specific career. You can't command him to give up his job. If he's doing something a lot. You can't command him to divorce his wife. Right? You can't command him to marry a specific goal. You can't do this in Islam. This is an Islam again, same with your adult daughter. There was an Arab Arab practice before Islam, that men would force their daughters to marry people. And Rasulullah sallallahu the end to this scene, you cannot get her married without her consent. This shows us it's
not blind obedience. I just have your parents emailing him Do you have to marry him. Unfortunately, some people don't understand this. And this has caused a lot of problems in our community, when people abuse the rights that are due upon them and take it to an extreme.
That third phase, the first phase, children must obey their parents. Adults must live in peace with their parents. So be kind to your parents, be respectful to your parents, spend time with them, maintain good relationships with them, found them visit them have a good relationship with them. Right. And this continues for most of your life until your parents reach a point or if they reach a point where they need you. Now this doesn't happen to everyone. For some people, their parents should be taking care of themselves till the very end, right hamdulillah especially nowadays, with the health and the technology and the wealth that the Ummah has, in many places, some people are
able to be take care of themselves right into the 80s and 90s. Right. So some for some people that never reach a point where they have to take care of their parents, but for others they will and for three different reasons. Reason number one, your parents grow old.
Right, your parents grow old. Now Bureau validation means taking care of them. Right, taking care of them, letting them move in with you
providing for them, giving them a good life, making sure what's left of their life is, is happy and luxurious and fine trying to pay them back for what they did for you when you were younger.
But it might not always be because they've grown old, it might be because of illness, you're someone's parents might be ill in the 40s. Right, and need people to take care of them. In that case, it will start at a younger age that you have to start taking care of your parents. Sometimes it's financial reasons.
You know, some parents may struggle financially, and whatever money they have, they may put it towards the children's education, that children grow up they be doing financially, well, the parents are still struggling. At that point, as a Muslim who's who, who understands your duty towards your parents, you should give your parents some share of that money, you should elevate their lifestyle, you should, you know, you shouldn't be living in luxury widely struggling, if you are living in luxury should be helping them live in luxury as well. It shouldn't be that the children and the grandchildren are enjoying life while the parents can't even afford to pay their bills. This is not
an Islamic way of treating your parents. So religious due to financial reasons or health reasons are old age. For many families, they will reach a point where you now have to take care of your parents. And this is the point where you now attempt to pay them back for what they did for you when you were younger. Right. And this is the final, this is the final phase while they're alive, then they pass away after that you make dua for them. And we'll come to our Hadees today on the stuff you can do after your parents pass away, to continue fulfilling their rights upon you.
Now in the modern world, there are certain challenges we face in regards to this topic.
Challenge number one is the concept of hyper individualism.
This idea that being pushed on young people, that it's your life, your rules, your desires, you don't owe anyone anything.
You know, we have young people telling the parents, I don't owe you anything you did what you have to do. You know, I don't. And this whole point of I don't owe you anything, you compare it to the Quranic language, the Hadith, or what the Hadith says about this topic. It's the complete opposite. Right? You come across a narration today, where a man was carrying his mother in tawaf. And you ask Abdullah, even Omar, did I pay her back for what she did for me when she was when she was young. And Abdullah, even Omar said, You didn't even pay her back for one pane of labor.
You haven't even pay the back for a single pane of labor. So this idea that you don't owe your parents anything, this is a very satanic idea. This is from shaitan. And this is causing a lot of problems today, where some children don't even want to have a relationship with their parents, they won't call them they won't visit them, they don't want anything to do with them. And this is highly problematic.
Another problem on the other side, you see, we said life goes through four phases, then we go to a circle of life. But the circle is breaking in our times. Because we have a large percentage of young men and woman who have no interest in marriage, we have no interest in becoming parents. Which means when they get old, that lineage comes to an end, that family comes to an end, there is no next generation. Right? You see, the way Allah created us is that we supposed to maintain lineage, we're supposed to keep the family going. So your children should grow up, get married, have their own children, their children should grow up, get married, have the orchard and this is how life goes on.
But now we are seeing a large percentage of young men and women in their 20s and 30s, saying I don't ever want to get married, or they get married, they want to have children. And if this was one or two individual, that's fine. That's an individual choice. But when this becomes the majority, when this becomes a large percentage of the community, then this is going to cause problems for the community 20 or 30 years down the line. This is going to cause a lot of serious problems. 20 or 30 years down the line.
When they realized too late, that they should have gotten married young, they should have had children they should have, you know, started their own families. And too often people are realizing this too late. They are realizing this when they can't have children. They are really realizing this when nobody's looking at them for marriage. They're looking at the real realizing this when they've already gone old and they left all alone and their parents have passed away and their siblings have passed away. And they're all of them. So this is becoming a major problem, that we have a marriage crisis. A large percentage of young people just don't see the importance of family anymore. And it's
also linked back to hyper individualism. Life's all about me and doing what I want and the freedom to fulfill my desires, then family is an obstacle to that. Family is the responsibility you don't want. Right if some young boys life's all about playing video games, then having a wife and children is going to get in the way of
that, right? So this, this hyper individualism is directly linked to this problem. A third problem we have is abuse and abuse happening on both ends. I already mentioned earlier, some parents abuse the status the parents have over the children, you know, forcing them into marriages, forcing them into jobs, forcing them into divorce. Parents don't have this level of authority over their children. Right.
And they misquote. Right. So there's a story where one of the Sahaba or I think was Omar Abdullah, one who told one of his sons to divorce his wife, right. I think it was almost a journal. And he did so. And we also know that Abraham, Islam told the Smiley's love to divorce his wife, and he did so. And in time of one of the great Imams, someone came and said, you know, they did that. So I also want my son to divorce his wife. And the mom simply said, you're not
you're not the primary Islam, you can't, you can't make this these type of decisions for your son. You see, in the case of, of Omar and Abraham and Islam, they noticed that the daughter in law had certain qualities that was not good for their son, there was going to lead him astray. So it wasn't divorce her for Nazi reasons. He was divorced, because she's causing spiritual harm to you. Right? It wasn't advice, it wasn't a commandment, it was advice coming from a place of wanting what's best for him. These days, it's about dunya. It's about, you know, dunya we reasons. So you can advise your son, this woman is not good for you, maybe you should break it up, but you can't command it,
you can't force it. Right. The other side of the abuse is we have children who abuse their parents and elders, right. They don't take care of them. They make them cry. They leave them in poverty. You know, they they leave them in the worst of states. These are things that happen in our community. And we deal with this a lot, where some children feel that they have absolutely no duty towards their parents, to such an extent that you will see a wealthy man whose mother is asking for a cup, because he doesn't spend a single cent on how these things happen. Right? You're in trouble. Right.
The fourth problem, which is really all of these summarize, as one is the preference of push personal pleasure over any responsibility, this is really the root of all the problems. People don't want to be responsible for anyone else anymore. And part of being a Muslim is embracing responsibility. By being responsible for your family, being responsible for your community, being a responsible member of the Ummah, this is part of being a Muslim. But we don't see this, you know what those young people who are being bombarded with these messages from the media that life's all about you and be yourself and enjoy your life and do what you want and be free. They they don't see
that responsibility is important. They see it as a burden, they see it as a hindrance. And as a result, they end up making choices that are very hedonistic, and in the long run, very dangerous and very detrimental to their own futures. So these are some of the problems that we face. And after we go through all the Hadees, I will like to discuss some potential solutions to these problems. And you can have an open discussion on that as well. But for now, let's read through these ahaadeeth as
quickly as we can, there's 46 Hadees in the section. So what I will do is I will just read through them without going through the full chain of narrators. And if any of these Hadees if I feel like it needs an immediate explanation, I'll do it otherwise, I'll come back to it later.
So the chapter begins actually with the Quranic verse, not to the Hadees Surah angebote Chapter 29 Verse number eight, that Allah says, We have, we have made it obligatory upon men of one people to be kind to their parents, right, will validate a husana that they are kind to the parents so
Imam Al Bukhari begins by telling us that this duty of kindness to parents is in the Quran. So he begins with one of the many verses of the Quran and makes this obligation upon us. Kindness to parents is a obligation mentioned specifically in the Quran. And then he begins with the first Hadees
and this hadith is our army Sheba and he said, that Abdullah even Mossad said, I asked, Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, which deed is most beloved to Allah. He said Salah on time, asked him after that, he said, Being kind to your parents, and I asked him after that, and he said, Jihad feasability Allah, if had asked him more, he would have told me even more things. So right from the beginning, it is establish being kind to your parents. Being good to your parents, is even more rewarding than Jihad visa vie Leila. Think about that for a minute. Jihad visa Vela literally sacrificing your life for the sake of Allah.
Being good to your parents is even higher in reward than that
Abdullah even rhodiola, on whom I said, the pleasure of Allah, Allah is in the pleasure of the parents, the angle of Allah lies in the angle of the parents. So this is a narration from Abdullah, even Omar. Right. And it's quite self explanatory. The next Hadees is one we all know. And you are nice. We all should know we have heard it from the time you were very young. And it's the rate of three times hear from three different chains of narrators. Oh yeah. Even Haider said, I asked the Prophet so all your solemn, who deserves my kindness the most. He said, Your mother asked them who he said, Your mother asked you and who he said your mother asked him who he said, your father and
then your closest relative.
And then again, Abu Huraira. And the rates that someone asked the prophets Lolly was salam, who should I be kind to most, he said, your mother then asked who he said, Your mother asked who he said your mother and then asked who he said your father. And then there's a third time the same, the ratio is repeated. So the point here is three different chains of narrators. It's possible the prophets lie some gave this advice to three different people. Or it's possible that altering the latest radio on one occasion, where he gave this advice either way, by repeating all three chains of narrators is showing that this is a very highly authentic Hadees that many Sahaba heard directly
from the Prophet slowly, some establishing that the person in this world that we should be kindness to is our mother. And then the Father. And the level of kindness and love that is due to the mother is three times more than the Father. Now, there are many discussions amongst the Obama on why, why is the status of the mother three times higher than the Father. And the many different reasons given I'll just give some of them. One is the mother makes more of the personal sacrifices, right. So that sacrifice historically had mostly been working hard to provide for the family. And that's, you know, that you do owe your father for your life for that. But Mum sacrifices often would be, you know, a
lot more just the pain of labor, that's nine months of pregnancy, you know, the whole,
you know, the whole looking after a baby, for some woman, if they had their careers to give up their careers to stay home and raise the children, right, there is all of this going on that needs to be repaid. This The second point is the alarm I bring up is that,
in general, and it's different for everybody. But in general, fathers want to be respected, and mothers want to be loved.
And so respect to fathers, this is something that's always mostly there, most of us will not tolerate disrespect from our children. But the love for the mother. Sometimes you need to be reminded of that. Because unfortunately, as we see with teenagers, young adults, they sometimes go off on their part, right? So they need constant reminders that you that you have this level of duty towards your mother, right.
And the third reason mentioned as to why the mother has three times more status than the father is that in Islam, the mother is really the heart of the whole.
And,
you know, in Islam, a mother has a very important role to play in society. That, you know, this issue of raising children is not a small thing in Islam, it's not, it's not something to be belittled, it's a very honorable duty. And part of the reward for the honorable duty is that your children should respect you honor you and take care of you for the rest of your life. Right. So it's a very honorable thing. Now the next generation, I went over it in our last session, so I won't go over it in much detail today. I know it's a bit of a bizarre one. But I find interesting. And we went over it already. Right. And this is a man came to Abdullah ibn Abbas and said, I asked the
woman to marry me and she refused to marry me. Another man asked her to marry him. And she agreed. So I became jealous and I killed her. Is there any way for me to make up for the sin?
Abdullah, even Abbas asked him, Is your mother alive? He said, No. He said, Then go and make yoga, repent to Allah and do as much good deeds as you can. A da said I went to Abdullah ibn Abbas confused and asked him Why did you ask him if his mother's alive? He said, I can't think of any deed that could make up for murder besides taking care of your mother in old age. Like, how do you make up for that? So the only remember when you make a person with a good deal of equal level. So how do you make up for mother? Is it the only good deal I could think of is taking care of your mother in old age. And since his mother is not around it, spent the rest of your life in Toba for that. Yeah,
it's a weird story. But these things happen.
The next day, this holds us that even if your parents aren't the best of people, even if they make mistakes, even if they are unfair to you, or they favor one of the other children over you, you still have to be kind to them. They still have rights over you. And again, this is a misconception. Some people have some people when you tell them to be kind to the parents like oh, well my mother is not perfect. My father is not perfect. Nobody's perfect. There's no perfect mother. There's no perfect father. You still have to be good to them. Right. So Abdullah ibn Abbas narrated
any Muslim who has parents and he's dutiful towards them.
seeking Allah's pleasure, Allah will open for him to gates of gender. If he has only one parent alive and then one gate of gender will be open for him. If he makes one of them angry, Allah will not be pleased with him until a parent is pleased to him. Abdullah ibn Abbas was asked What if his parents mistreated him, he said, even if he mistreated them, he still has to be kind to watch them. Write your parents mistakes and sins does not absolve you of your responsibility. Because there is no such thing as a perfect person, there is no such thing as perfect parents. So it may be that your parents love your brother more than you or they favor your sister more than you doesn't matter, you
still have the same duty to watch them.
The next Hadees is narrated,
that someone asked
what are the major sins? Right? And somebody made me the main mentioned the list of what are the major sins, Abdullah even corrected him and said, those are not major sins. The major sins are nine, to worship someone besides Allah to kill someone to abandon the army to slander a chaste woman to engage in rebar to steal the route of orphans, to outer blasphemy in the haram
to mock Muslims, and to make your parents cry out of disobedience. So in this hadith, Abdullah even over let's what are the major sins and one of them you mentioned is to destroy to mistreat your parents to such an extent they start to cry, right that this is a major sin. So even when it comes to the relationship between parent and child, there are gradations of, of major and minor, right? Having a small disagreement, your appearance, which which irritates them might be a minor, mistreating them so badly that they start to cry, this would be a major sign. Right? So there's levels to this.
Up did I even omitted then said Do you feel the fire? Do you want to enter the Garden? And the people say by Allah? Yes. You said, Are your parents still alive? He said my mother. Yes. He said by Allah, if you take if you are kind to her and you feed her, you will enter the Garden as long as you avoid the major sins. This is another point that we will come to soon, which is one of the past to Jana is to take care of your parents in old age, as a means of forgiveness of all our sins, right to take care of the parents in old age is a means of forgiveness for our sins.
The next generation it is mentioned that the verse of the Quran that says lower your wing out of humility for your parents, one of the Sahaba explained it to me. Do not refuse them anything that they love, mean anything that your parents love, do it for them. Make them smile, make them laugh, be the person who always makes them happy. Don't refuse to do something if you know they love it.
The next chapter is on repaying your parents for the for what they've done for you. Can you ever repay your mother or your father for what they have done for you? So the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said, a child cannot pay back his father, unless he finds his father as a slave buys him and sets him free.
The only way to pay back your father for all the good he's done for you is if you had to find him as a slave by him and set him free. Now this never happens, right? What's the chances of finding your father as a slave and then buying him sitting in free, but the point here is to see that you can never pay back your father. Right? There's nothing that we can do, especially today with the original slavery. There is nothing we can do to pay back our father for what sacrifices they made. When we were young.
Abdullah Omar saw a man going around the Kaaba making the walk with his mother on his back. The man asked Abdullah ibn Omar did I pay her back for what she did for me when I was young. He said not even for a single pane of labor.
So this hadith, we went over it already, right? That nothing you do can make up for your mother and
all the sacrifices she made when you were younger. The first one's about the Father. The second one's about the mother, showing in both cases you cannot make up for it.
The next generation is about Abu Huraira. And his mother.
Abu Rayleigh used to live next door to his mother, and he would greet her and she would greet him and he would make dua for her and she would make dua for him. And this would happen every time he would visit home. Right? So Abdullah Abu Huraira and his mother had a very close relationship. In fact, there's multiple generations about it in the book. And you find that every time he greeted her he would make to offer and she would make to offer this was a practice in his home. He lived next door to his mother and every day you would visit her and they will make dua for each other.
Abdullah even Ahmed says a man came to the Prophet sallahu wa sallam to make Hijra and said that he lived his parents crying. The prophets are some
So long as I'm saying, Go back home and make them laugh just as you made them cry. So don't abandon your parents, right don't leave them crying.
Next narration it says
Okay, so the repetition of the other narration of Abu Huraira that she has to make dua, his mother used to make dua for him and he used to make dua for her. Right that narration is repeated twice. Then it is narrated, what are the major sins, two major sins are to the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said the major sins are to worship someone besides Allah, and to disobey your parents and to lie in court to lie in a in a court case. Right? Three major sins I mentioned this hadith, Schilke
unkind treatment appearance and lying in a court case.
Then the next narration mentions that the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam forbade people from cursing their parents. And one of the Sahaba asked what what whoever who curses the parents and the prophets was I'm explained, you curse somebody else's parents. So in return, they cost your parents, meaning, don't say things to other people that will cause them to curse your parents. Right? So don't use language that is cursing somebody else's parents. You know, there are many common phrases people use these days, where you're essentially cursing somebody else's mother. Don't use that kind of language because if they use that language, you're new, they're cursing your mother. Right? So
you shouldn't talk babble anywhere, anybody else's parents because that will cause them to talk bad about your parents.
The next chapter is to obey your parents as long as they don't ask you to do anything haram.
The prophets of Allah Allah He was on commanded nine things. Right? He actually he warned about nine things. Number one, do not worship anyone besides Allah. Number two, do not abandon the salah deliberately meaning pray all your Salah on time. Number three, never drink alcohol because it is the key of all evil. Number four, obey your parents, even if they need your world, give it to them for the sake of Allah. Number of
number five, do not rebel against the ruler. Number six, do not run away from the army. Number seven, take care of your wife. Number eight, Do not raise your hand against your wife. And number nine, fear Allah regarding your family. So this hadith are some of the main commandments in Islam. Worship Allah alone, pray your Salah, be kind to your parents. Don't be abusive to your family, take care of your family. And these are from the commandments of Islam. Abdullah Ahmed said a man came to the Prophet salallahu Salam and he said I came to the hijra, and I left my parents in tears. He said go back and make them laugh like you made him cry. This hadith is repeated three times the time he
mentioned the jihad instead of Hijra. So this could be two different stories. In fact, the dead one says, man wanted to join the Prophet series and for jihad. The Prophet sallallahu sallam said, Are your parents still alive? He said, Yes, he said, Your jihad is to take care of them. Your jihad is to take care of your parents in old age. Again, he goes back to the first Hadees when the Prophet SAW as I mentioned, the three most beloved deeds to Allah number one Salah on time, number two, caring for your parents. Number three, Jihad visibility Allah. so caring for your parents is higher than Jihad visibility law. In this case, they were the Sahaba you had elderly parents, and you
wanted to go for jihad, and the prophets or Islam tells him your jihad is to stay and to care for your parents. That's more important because they already had enough soldiers. But who's gonna take care of these elderly people if all the young men go to war, say someone Someone has to stay back and take care of them?
The next hadith is about the reward of taking care of your parents in old age.
The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said woe to him well, to him well, to him, the Sahaba asked who and the prophets always said the one who finds his parents one or both of them reaches old age, and he still enters the fire because he did not take care of them. So this hadith says that
if someone's pins reach old age, and that person still ends up in the hellfire,
that means he didn't take care of his parents in old age. Why? Because taking care of your parents in old age is a means of forgiveness of all your sins. Right? So if you're one of your parents reaches old age and you have the opportunity to take care of them, then and you don't do that, you are missing out on an opportunity to have all your sins forgiven. And it's really your own fault if you end up in Johanna because of that. That's what Rasulullah saw some is saying in this hadith.
And next Hadith he says Jana is for the one who is kind to his parents, but Allah grant them a long life. Right Allah will grant him a long life so they will get Jana and the long life taking care of your parents.
The next few generations about what if your parents are not a Muslim? Right? So this is important for converts, right? What and for the Sahaba mania they will convert so, you know, these were conversations that happened about their parents. So it pretty much said that we used to make dua for our parents until the verse was revealed that do not make dua for those who die the puncher who has a creamer, who was his father.
He says we used to make dua for our parents, right, until the command was revealed in Surah Toba that is not befitting for the Prophet and the believers to make dua for those who died upon shirk, who was the father of a crema?
I will
I will Jehan. His father wasn't just he didn't just die upon shirk. He was the leader of the enemies of Islam, he was the pharaoh of this ummah. But his son crema, was one of the Sahaba who died and Shahidi feasability Allah and he says that it is not permissible to make dua for Allah to forgive your parents. If they died upon Cofer. While they are alive, you can make dua to Allah to guide them. Once they die, that's between them and Allah, you cannot make that work for them now, right?
However, you must still be kind to them. Josiah, even ABI Waqqas said four verses of the Quran were revealed because of me and only one is mentioned. Yeah, because that one relates to the parents. He said that when they converted to Islam, my mother promised never to eat or drink until I abandoned Islam. And so Allah revealed the verse to be kind to your parents, but at the command you to disobey Allah, then do not obey them, but love with them in kindness, show Sorry, I'm gonna be accosted this verse was revealed because of his mother, that when he converted to Islam, his mother said, I'm not going to eat and drink until you leave Islam. And so Allah revealed the verse saying, be kind to
your mother, but don't obey her in the disobedience of Allah. So this sets the limits of obedience to parents, your parents cannot command you to do something haram. Right. As for the other three that you mentioned, they're not related to our topic, but one is the verse about the war booty. One is the verse about dividing the property after after someone passes away, in terms of giving a bequest, and the fourth one was the prohibition of alcohol. Right, all of these verses, sorry, it will be workers was involved in their reasons for revelation radula, one who, as mob in the army backer and the rates, that during the Treaty of Abia, my mother came to me, and she was not a Muslim
yet. So I asked the prophets law you some do you have to maintain ties with her? And he said, Yes. So this is very clear and explicit, I smile. Her mother was not a Muslim yet. And she asked the Prophet Do I still have to have a good relationship with her? And the Prophet said? Yes. So this means even your parents are not Muslim. If you're a convert, you still have to be kind towards your parents. Right. Abdullah ibn Omar said that Omar Rajala, and who saw a silk road for sale, so he bought it and the Prophet SAW I told him that it's not permissible to Wes for men to wear silk. So he gave it to one of his non Muslim relatives. So the explanation here is that kindness to non
Muslim family is not just your parents, it's to any non Muslim family. Right? It's not it's not linked only to your parents. Okay, you're almost done with that hadith, and we'll get back to our explanation.
The Prophet sallallahu sallam said that cursing your parents is a major sin, the Sahaba asked who curses their parents. He said, if you curse someone else, and in return, they curse your parents.
And Abdullah, even explained and he said a man because someone so much that person curses his parents in return and this is a major sin in the sight of Allah.
The Prophet sallallahu sallam said, there is no sin, more likely to bring punishment in this world, as well as the afterlife, then oppression and the breaking of ties of kinship with your parents specifically, right? So what are the sins that cause us to come in this world? We know for most of our sins, Allah gives us the rest of our lives to repent, there are certain sins that bring about the exam of Allah straightaway. Right? One Islam if you oppress someone, then Allah will punish the oppression in this world. Right? And the other is breaking the ties of kinship and the School of acid as he mentioned in the chapter appearance, because it's even worse if you're breaking ties with
your own parents, right?
You may not even Hussein said that the Prophet sallallahu sallam said,
or what is the punishment? What do you what do you think about Zina and drinking wine and theft? And they said that these are major sins but I tell you what is even greater sin, to worship someone besides Allah and to disobey your parents and to lie in court. Right? So this hadith says that to disobey your parents is the greatest tendency now. It's the greatest thing in drinking alcohol. It's the greatest Indian stealing to mistreat your parents.
ones is worse than committing Zina. It's worse than drinking alcohol. That's how it ranks in the list of major sins. Abdullah, even Omar said making parents weep is part of disobedience and therefore a major sin.
The next chapter is very important. It is the chapter on the dua of parents, the prophets, Allah Islam said three dewasa answered the dua of someone who is oppressed, the dua of the traveler and the dua for the parents. And he specifically mentioned the dua of a parent against the child. Right. And the commentators say that the only time of pain to never make dua against the child if the child is so bad, that they don't know what else to do about it. Because you know, the people you have the most patients with your own children.
It's called the rich such a bad level that they must be truly abusive or violent or really bad people that the parents will actually make do against him, and usually a case of oppression and the earlier part of the Hadith says, the oppressed make dua dua is answered, right. The next narration, we will skip for now because it's a very long story, the story of Jurij the monk, has anyone familiar with the story of Jurij, the monk, by the way, the word generate some seats that has a bit of George Wright, actually George the monk, but the Arabic is called Jurij.
So basically, to summarize the story, it says that Jurij, he was a monk and he was worshiping Allah, and his mother called out to him, and he didn't respond to his mother and she got irritated, and she made a dua against him, and the DUA ended up coming through. Right, the DUA ended up coming through. So it's building upon the previous Hadith, the previous Hadith says that the dua of the parent against the child will be answered. And it's followed by a story of a monk who this happened to.
Okay, offering Islam to a Christian mother, the next hadith is about the importance of doing Dawa to your parents if they are not Muslim.
Right. And it's Narrated by Abu Huraira radula, one who, that his mother was not a Muslim, saying he called it towards Islam and she got angry. So he went to the prophets Eliza message, make dua for her to the Prophet slicin. We do offer her and he went back home and his mother took her shahada, and she converted to Islam. Right. So this hadith teaches us that if someone converts to Islam, it's their duty to do Dawa to their parents and to make to offer their parents as Abu Huraira did for his own mother.
With the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa salam when a man asked
Is there anything I can do for my parents after the death, this is an important Hadith.
She said, there's four stages of life when it comes to your parents, right? When you were a child, when your adult when they grow old. The fourth stage is after they passed away, after your parents passed away, your duty towards them does not stop. So a man asked the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam Is there anything I can do for my parents after their death, he said four things to remember these four things. Number one, making dua for them and asking forgiveness for them never stopped making to offer your parents doesn't matter if they passed away 30 years ago, 40 years ago, never stopped making to offer them this is their right upon you that you always remember them in your to
us. Number two, that you fulfill the oats. So if they had anything left behind, whether it's distributing the inheritance, whether it's making up with some SCADA Demers, or some faster they must, or hedge, you know, or whether it's they had a they swore an oath to do something, some good deeds, like building a well or building a machine to do this on their behalf. It's part of after they passed away, it's part of your dutifulness to them. Number three, to maintain good relationships with their friends. This is one we don't think about. One of the rights of your parents upon you is even after they passed away, you maintain a good relationship with deference.
How many of us even know who our parents friends up, leave, don't have good relationships with them. And number four, that you maintain family ties, part of your duty towards your parents, even after they passed away, that you maintain family ties with their brothers and their sisters and their nephews and nieces. You don't fall apart. You know, unfortunately for many families, once the, you know, the head of the family passes away, people start drifting away from each other. But part of that dutifulness towards your parents
is that you remain in contact with your parents, brothers and sisters and the rest of the family long after they have passed away. Don't you don't isolate yourself from them. They are still your family for life. So these are the four things mentioned.
And next, Heidi's a very beautiful one. I will read I said that somebody after dying will feel themselves being moved up upgraded, they will find the position in the afterlife be upgraded. And they will ask Allah why am I being upgraded? And he said because your child is making dua for you. Or because your child is asking for
giveness for you. So this means someone could pass away and they will end up in a very low level right of gender. But in for the next 3040 50 years, the descendants are making dua for them every single time the level is going higher. So you do ours our actual impact on the akhirah of your parents.
The next Hadees is narrated that Abu Huraira
said, Oh, well, we went to Abu Zubaydah, and he said, Oh, ALLAH forgive Abu Huraira and his mother and whoever asked forgiveness for them. So Mohammed bin serene says we will always make dua for Abu Huraira and his mother, because of the dua of Abu Huraira. So Abdullah said, Me, oh, Allah forgive me and my mother and anyone who makes to offer us right. So because of that, his students will always make dua for his mother because they wanted to be included in that towards Allah forgives them, because they made dua for him. Again, you know, so all these narrations, the love that Abu Huraira had for his mother, it keeps coming back Abu Huraira and his mother, like the other person
who keeps coming back with the mother story, it would be sad even you know, even Abby, what costs right. Unfortunately, in his case, it was a much more harsher story. But Abu Huraira his mother converted to Islam. So there was you could see that love. Continuing after that.
I will read Rajan who said that the prophets lie some said when a person passes away, all of his deeds come to an end besides three, we also know this hadith, I mentioned it many, many footpaths, what are the three deeds that continue after?
After you pass away?
Charity, knowledge and children they make dua for you. Right. So why is it mentioned you make dua for your parents who have passed away? Right. Abdullah ibn Abbas said a man said, oh rasool Allah my mother passed away without a will. Will it help her if I give sadaqa on her behalf? And the prophets, Allah Islam said, yes. So this hadith is the proof that you can give sadaqa on behalf of the deceased. Right? If somebody passed away and you want to give sadaqa on their behalf, then this is one of the many, many Hadith that is proof of that. And by doing the Sahil Buhari, there are even more Hadees to prove that right.
The next Hadees is actually a story that Abdullah even Omar was walking and a man greeted him and asked him Are you Omar son? And he said yes. And Omar, Abdullah Omar recognize this man is one of his father's friends. So he gave him
a turban and a donkey and he gave him a few things. And one of Abdullah even numerous companions asked him, Why did you give this man these things? And he said that the Prophet sallallahu sallam said that you should love those whom your father loved and you should not break ties with them.
So Abdullah bin Omar received many years after his father Omar who passed away, he met a man who was a friend of his father. So out of love for his father, he gave his man and gift right and said that part of loving your father is that you maintain good relationship with his friends after he passes away.
And then he mentioned Abdullah ibn Omar said that the prophets of Allah Islam said, The best way to maintain relationships. The best way to be kind to your parents, after they have passed away is to maintain relationships with the people they loved.
If your father or your mother loved someone, you continue to have a good relationship with them after your parents have passed away. That's part of being kind to your parents, as part of honoring them after they're passed away, that you continue to be good to those whom they were good to. Okay just for the hotties left.
The next Hadith, Abdullah ibn Salam who who is Abdullah ibn Salam.
Does anyone know Abdullah ibn Salam generates you from the Torah? Does anyone know who he was?
He was the chief rabbi of Medina.
And one of the first of the Jews of Medina to convert to Islam. Right. He is the chief rabbi of Medina. And he immediately recognized the Rasulullah saw Islam was the true messenger and he converted to Islam. So he narrates and he says, by the one who said Muhammad would the truth, it is mentioned in the Torah twice, to not cut off relations with those whom your father loved, to not cut off relations with those whom your father love. So again, he's confirming that the Torah had the same message as Islam when it comes to this topic, that you should honor the relationship of those whom your father loved. And the next generation it says that the prophets of Allah Islam said love
is inherited. Love is inherited. There's many interpretations of this, but linking it to the chapter, it means that you should love those whom your parents loved, and your children should love those whom you love. And this should be part of the inheritance, that you continue to love the same people and some, and that this love should be kept alive. The last three generations are on respecting your parents by not calling them by the names, right.
Abu Huraira so two men are
talking and he asked one man who is this other person to you, and he said this in my father. So he said, Do not call him by his name, do not walk in front of him and do not sit before he does. So I was teaching this man how to respect his father, do not call your father by your foot by his first name, right, do not walk in front of him and do not sit before he sits.
And the next generations mentioned that when the Sahaba used to adjust their father, they would address them by their Konya. So Abdullah, even Omar sons would call him Abu Abdul Rahman, and Abdullah, even Omar will call his father Abu Hafs. So they will never address their parents by their first names. Again, this is
it's not something that we think we should talk that we need to mention. But nowadays, you do get people who call their parents by their first names, right? Not so much in our community. But I've seen in other communities and Islamically, it is completely wrong. It's completely against the respect of Islam. To adjust your parents by their first name, always suggest them by a loving title. So in those days, they will call them Abu Bakr or I will have so I will some nowadays, you can say Father or dad or mom, something like this is fine, as long as it's a respectful word, the day that they like to be called by.
Okay, so those are the Hadees that on parenting before I go into some of the lessons from it, does anyone want to add anything, anything that you picked up from this hadith, so any questions you have on the Hadith, we went over any Hadees, you didn't understand or want me to explain a bit more.
If not, we'll just jump right into it. Because we are running out of time. Now.
Some of the lessons we can take from this chapter. Number one,
Ben will validate being kind to parents is a lifelong obligation, regardless of the flaws of your parents,
no more than ideologies will tell you that if your mother or father was not perfect, they had some human flaws, you know, then you have the right to cut them off, you have the right to, you know, not have any relationship with them. This is not Islamic Islamically, you should always always try to have a some kind of good relationship with your parents now obviously be exceptions to the rule. But we're talking about the general rule, an exception would be in a case where a parent is truly abusive, right, and that any kind of contact with them gonna end up in violence or abuse or something of that nature. But again, those are exceptional cases that should be dealt with on a case
by case basis. The general rule is,
regardless of your parents laws, you should always fulfill their rights.
Also, that the greatest good deed after Tawheed and Salah is kindness to parents. We also learned that caring for parents in old age is the path to paradise. Now,
a lot of people say but it's hard. It's hard to take care of your parents in old age.
And the responses since when is the path to paradise easy.
This is listed as the greater good deed and Jihad is jihad easy. Jihad is the hardest thing.
So if taking care of your parents in old age, is a greater good deed and jihad.
By default, it should be harder than jihad. Right? But otherwise, why is there more than word for it? It's not meant to be easy. That's why there's so much reward for it. The kind of good deeds that cause all your sins to be forgiven? Are the hard good deeds, not the easy good deeds. Right? Think about what are the good deeds because all of your sins to be forgiven? Dying is a martyr, Shahid. Right, or an accepted hij. In taking care of your parents in old age. These aren't easy things. But these are the parts to paradise. Right? So yes, it's not easy. This is why the prophets wasn't even quality, the jihad when he told that to have been the generation that your jihad is to take care of
your parents. The fact that he called it a jihad means it's not. It's not easy, right? It is something that that you will struggle with, it is something that will be mentally taxing, it's something that will be emotionally taxing. But that's why there is so much reward for it.
So if anyone is in a situation where they have to take care of a parent in old age,
the way one of the ways to motivate yourself through it, is to remember that this is something that is pleasing to Allah. And this is one of the past agenda. Right? And remember that no matter what you do for your parents in their old age, you cannot make up for what they did for you when you were younger, you cannot make up for that.
Today, next important rule we learned from this there is no obedience to the creation in the disobedience of the Creator. Right? And again, you know, some parents tried to exploit the obedience card by getting the children to do whatever they want when they are adults. Islamically you cannot do this you should not do this. Rather they should be mutual love and respect in the family. They shouldn't be exploitation by from anyone towards anyone else. And finally something we learned that many
As many of us are, might be unaware of, or might overlook general, is that loving the people that your parents love is a good deed.
And again, how many of us know who our parents friends are? How many of us know who the heroes are? Who the teachers are? How many of us know who are the people, they look up to? How many of us make an effort to try and reach out to them and have some kind of, you know, a close friendship with them as well. We see Rasulullah saw some he also did this right.
That there was a One of the innovations that an old lady
after the conquest of Makkah and old lady in Makkah, came to visit the Prophet slowly Islam and he honored her and he's treated very respectfully. And he sat with her and spoke with her for a long time. And one of the Sahaba asked Who was this and then he mentioned, it was like Halima, Saudi has sister or friend. So he remembered that when he was a baby Halima, Satya took care of him. And this is her friend. So he's honoring her friends 50 years later, 60 years later, honoring her friends. Right, Mecanim exactly, you might have gotten the names wrong. But this is the kind of stories that we get from our predecessors of how they would honor the Friends of their parents years after their
parents had passed away. That's part of loving our parents. To conclude, we live in a time where our challenges when it comes to the parent child relationship are unique.
We don't have the social structures of the past where children would naturally grow up to become parents, right, and that the circle of life would continue. You know, there was a time where you wouldn't have to teach children to respect their parents, it was the default. Right? You wouldn't have to push people to get married and have their own children. He was the default. But we living in a strange time. And so we need some solutions to contemporary problems. One of the solutions, I believe, is that from a young age, we educate our children on Islamic manners and character.
We shouldn't be yearning these Hadees for the first time in our 50s and 60s, right, these Hadees should be part of our school curriculums from the very beginning.
You know,
whenever I teach parenting, or homeschooling courses, I always encourage parents, that when it comes to other o'clock, the education should start around the age of three or 4/5 Aqeedah that you can teach him the seven eight years old, but other than o'clock from the time they have any basic understanding, they should understand honesty, they should understand just this you understand kindness is you understand forgiveness, other work, Love should come first. And the the early scholars used to say study or double before you study or double before. And I say take this and apply to your parenting approach, that from the beginning, raise your children or otherwise o'clock,
because that that's what a relationship is built on relationships are built on fit. They're built on adults who o'clock.
Another thing that we can do is we can model for the younger generation how they should be. So those of us who may be experiencing our own children rebelling against us or being disrespectful to us, we should first think about how what is our relationship like with our own parents?
Are we fulfilling the rights of our parents? Are we modeling for our children the kind of behavior we want them to have?
Because if many times you know, you will see that cycles repeat itself, and the people of our generation who are mistreating their parents will be mistreated by their children. Right. And this cycle continues. So someone needs to break the cycle, someone needs to say, Hold on, I'm going to be the one who's good to my parents. And this will be the model that your children will will see. And this is what they will, you know, this is what they will follow that they see in their parents. You know, they they they see the parents taking care of the elders in the family, for example. So when they grow up, they know they're going to have to do the same. So we need to model this for our
children.
Another thing that needs to change in our education system specifically, and in our parenting style, is focusing on family as an actual topic.
Right. And I mentioned this point over and over again in the cookbook, because this is something that I'm I'm I believe it's very important for our community. Our focus these days is too much on grades and careers. We are just raising people to get all A's in school and to do well in their careers. We're not teaching them how to be husbands. We're not teaching them how to be wives not teaching them how to be parents, without teaching them how to be neighbors. We're not teaching them how to volunteer how to serve the community, how to help the poor, how to help the orphans, we just teaching them get all A's and do well in your career. And many of these people are not equipped for
the real world, many of them by the age of 25 or 30. They are still children. They don't know how to take care of themselves. They don't
Know how to get married, they don't know how to take care of a spouse, they don't know how to raise children, because we're not teaching them these things. Now, in the past, these things would be taught through, you know, societal interactions. You know, they say it takes a village to raise a child, in the past everyone with the community, they would see the parents and the uncles and aunts and the grandparents and the neighbors all interacting with each other, and they would learn from this. But one of the problems we're facing now, especially in the post COVID age, is we all becoming silos, everyone's homes becoming separate, everyone's lives becoming separate. And we don't
interacting enough without relatively not interacting enough with our neighbors, we're not interacting enough with our communities. And so our children are not seeing this, they're not seeing this being close to your, to your family members, some people, you know, they literally be living in the same town as their family members, they only see them once or twice a year on eBay, right. Because we've all becoming our own silos, we all becoming just caught up in our own life is just work and home and work and home. And we don't have this community sense, we don't have this sense of, of being there for others.
And this is affecting the younger generation, they many of them are not equipped to get married. Many of the young men and women who come to me and say they can't get married, when you actually sit and talk to them. They're not ready for marriage. And they should have been ready for marriage 10 years ago, but no one taught him don't want taught him the life skills, they need to be selfless, to be responsible to be caring for somebody else. And so they never, they're not married, and they're not ready for marriage. And if their lives go on despite they'll never be ready for it because no one's teaching them these things. So we need to be serious about having actual education for
teenagers, on topics like marriage, and parenting, and community service and workplace ethics. Because these are skills they need when they grow up. These are skills they're going to need once they're out of school. And no one is teaching these skills. You know, there's a new term amongst the non Muslims. They call it adulting adulting classes, anyone heard of adulting
adulting classes, basically classes on how to be an adult.
The fact that you need adulting classes means parents have failed. The fact that parents haven't taught their children, if you if you see the actual adulting classes, they're teaching them, you know, how to attract a spouse, how to raise children how to pay taxes, how to go for a job interview.
And most of the people who sign up for these classes say My parents never taught me anything. It was just school and had dumped me into the world expect me to figure it out on my own. So the fact that they had to invent a term called adulting. And say we need adulting classes means a whole generation of parents failed to teach their children how to be adults. Right. So this is something that needs to change really need to, I believe it should be part of the high school curriculum. Really at the high school level, whether it's Islamic studies or life skills. It should be part of a high school curriculum, marriage, parenting, workplace ethics, being part of a community, these things should be
part of the high school curriculum. So when someone finishes high school, they are ready for adult life. They're not just children thrown into the adult world, but they're able to think like adults and have an adult life.
I also advise all of us to have close ties with our children to raise them in a loving way to build strong ties with them from a young age. Too many parents don't have a relationship with their children. before they know it, their kids are 18 or 20 and disrespecting them. And they want to start building a relationship at that age. And it's much harder to start building a relationship at that age start when they are young. The prophets will allow you some windy When he kissed his grandson in public and the man said I have 10 sons I've never kissed any of them. The Prophet sallallahu sallam said whoever does not show compassion will not be shown compassion. I wanted the
interpretations of this hadith is that whoever is not compassionate to small children shouldn't should not expect those children to grow up and be compassionate to him. How you treat your children is how they're going to treat you when they grow up. So if you raise your children with love and compassion, and Inshallah, Allah is the one who guides the heart, but that's our job is to at least raise them with love and compassion, and with the correct knowledge and the correct adab. Inshallah, when they grow up, they will return the favor upon us. Finally, it takes a village to raise a child, we need to figure out ways to rebuild that village. We need to become a society again, we need to
get out of our silos we need to get out of our individual lives. We need to be a community again, whether it's sitting together for Halaqaat, whether it's having community gatherings, whether it's spending more time with families, whether it's having family reunion events, whether it's, you know hanging out to family members you haven't spoken to in years, but we have to find ways to reconnect.
As the world is getting more connected in terms of technology. We are getting more disconnected from the people right now.
To us, and we find that people living in the same home and are strangers to each other. And we need to find a way to rebuild that sense of society, where children grew up in an environment where they have close relationships with every member of the family. They know the uncles, they know their aunts, they know their cousins, they know the grandparents, they know their cousins, cousins, right? They have these relationships. And they learn and they benefit and they grow from all of these relationships. This is very important. I'm afraid for many families that we deal with these days, they are losing this. They are losing this, there are some children who don't even know who their
cousins are, or who they uncover an answer, right. And this is sad, because then you don't have the sense of extended family. And when we come to chapter two, chapter two of this book is on maintaining family ties. That's the next topic maintaining family ties, because that's the second most important part in other word clock after being kind to your parents is maintaining family ties. Inshallah, we will discuss maintaining family ties in details in our next session. With that we come to a conclusion for today. If there's any questions, we will take questions for five or 10 minutes, and then close off questions or comments or feedback.
Those knows, there's a whole group of people who don't want to get
to it, you know, those who don't want to get married, and those who just haven't managed to get just going to find the right person.
That's a good point. So you get those who don't want to get married and those who can't find someone. Or they just, they never, they wanted to get married, but they never met someone who agreed to marry them or something, or someone who they found suitable, right? That is another marriage crisis we are dealing with. A lot of people want to get married, but they just can't find anyone. And I found that to be for multiple reasons.
One of them being that people have ridiculous expectations for marriage these days. I'd like when you actually ask them like what you're looking for in a husband or wife, they give you a 20 page list, right? Like, they want them to be perfect in every possible way. And the person giving you that list isn't perfect themselves, right? They like the most average person and they want the most perfect spouse. We're not realistic anymore. And I feel like people everybody wants that wife whose husband was like this perfect model in terms of looks, but also a perfect in terms of Dean, already wealthy as a as wealthy as a 45 year old should be by the age of 20. I didn't like it just
unrealistic. And I think we have to teach our children to be more realistic in what to look for in a spouse. And just to give you some ideas of what's what's happening, for example, a lot of young ladies want to get married and just can't find someone, you ask them what they're looking for. They want to marry a millionaire. The average guy, their age is not a millionaire, you can grow together, you can add value to a guy, you'll work hard in 20 or 30 years ago, maybe it'd be a millionaire, right? If someone's a millionaire, by the age of 20, they probably a spoiled kid who never worked a day in their life, you're not going to be a good husband.
But
again, the wealth is not it's not the object, it's the o'clock the character that matters, right? If you marry a young man who has a good work ethic, and who's who's, you know, has good character, then together, you can pull that well, likewise, you know, you get the young man who wants his wife to be perfect. And he's got the ridiculous list of, of expectations. You know,
like, sometimes they even have the list of one my wife to treat my mother like this, and I want my wife to feed my father like this. That's not how relationships work. You can't build a relationship like that, we will need to go back to basics that if you know, there's attraction, the good Muslims, they have good character, they come from good families. Bismillah make Nikka you can figure out the details together. And you need to go back to that that's what worked for the older generations. The younger generations are going to, to specific in what they want, and they can't find someone that meets those specifics. needs. I met someone 20 years ago, who gave me one of those lists that what
he's looking for in a wife and I met him a few months ago, he's not married.
So
that's another problem. As we get older, we get more fuzzier. So when people used to get married at the age of 18, or 20, they should look for you know, Dini o'clock could family. Now, people didn't email in the 30s and 40s they have the most ridiculous list because they're so used to living alone and heavy things exactly the way they want someone who fits into their life, not someone to build a life together with and that's where it goes back to some other advice I give that people don't like to get married young, get married young. It solves a lot of problems. You leave it for too late. It's creates way too many problems
even if they're pros Yes.
is a way, like, parents disowned the children because they don't like the spouse they chose, right? Even if they made the right
race or tribe and things I
recently attended to, because the parents didn't attend because, like
what's your investigation? Okay.
So
even in that case, it's still your duty to be kind to your parents, right? So if you look at the verse in the Quran that was revealed for Saudi btw Akash, when his mother was trying to get him to do something haram, what is the verse say, he said, do not obey them, but live with them in kindness, to not obey them, but live with them in kindness. So, if parents are objecting to a marriage for a ridiculous and Islamic reason,
you don't have to listen to your parents, you can still make the nickel.
But you still have to be kind to them, you still have to reach out to them. And if you are kind to them, and your wife is kind to them, and what will happen is over the years, they'll shop for me or it won't be immediately. But over the years, they realize this is a nice guy. Why are we being mean to what is it a nice family? Why are we being mean to them, eventually, they'll soften up maybe they don't soften up you did your duty, by being kind to them, You did your duty, and your reward will be with Allah. But
be if your parents are cutting you off, doesn't mean you should be cutting them off. And this, this will come just in the next chapter. There's a specific Hadith in the next chapter, that the reward of maintaining family ties is to reach out to those who are trying to break ties with you. If a family member is trying to break off from you, and you are trying to maintain a relationship with them, that's where the reward lies. Right?
Yes, yeah, the problem is with the parents image, this doesn't fit the image.
Yeah, so that's a problem with the parents have an issue and that in that case, the children don't have to obey them in that, because they're the parents are wrong, but they still have to be kind to the parents, they still have to, you know, be good to them in other ways. And what the parents, if the parents have any humanitarian, any kindness in their hearts, eventually, after a few years, they will realize that the child was right. Right, or they at least learn to get along with them. But the child's job in that case is to keep reaching out and to keep trying to maintain a good relationship. But they don't have to obey their parents on that specific issue because their parents are wrong on
that issue. Right. Depends don't have the right to cut off ties with them for a perfectly halal and Islamic marriage. Right. If if all the Islamic conditions are met? So another thing if the doing a haram marriage or marriage, that's going to affect the Eman then it's understandable depends, disagree with it. But if it's if the parents are wrong, then the children don't have to obey them, but they must be kind to them. Right.
Any other questions come in?
Is like the person isn't holding enough.
Mr.
Muslim, but not only enough, not holy enough.
Who's holy enough? Anyone else?
Yeah, that's true. But the end of the day, we don't know who's ending his way.
Right? We don't know. Again, that comes down to judging others that if someone feels the holier than somebody else, that itself is a problem of their own ego, no Muslim who has humility, things are more pious than somebody else. Right? The end of the day, you know,
if the person is doing the basics of practicing Islam, remember, especially with young people, again, a young person is not going to be on that level of Imam and piety as a 50 or 60 year old. You're going to have their flaws. They get married, they grow together. I know of one young couple that recently they got married. She never used to wear hijab. He never used to pray salah, they made niqab she taught him to pray five times a day he taught her to wear hijab they both have hamdulillah good Muslims now. Right? But like if they had to go with that mentality on day one that you know what, she's not wearing hijab, or he doesn't pray salah, but you know, the Nikka
I mean,
are not one hand you can understand the other hand, the young people need to get married, right? If you don't, if you want to get together we have it haram things are going to happen. And people change as they grow. If they have good hearts, they're sincere. They're struggling with a specific good deed but their heart is sincerely in the right direction, inshallah they'll grow and do it over time. So not everyone is going to be perfect. I've seen people get divorced over the spouse having a minus, right? Like, literally a sister who was a practicing Muslim in every way but had one bad habit. She used to listen to music husband, he was afraid. If you're going to divorce some of the
having one minus and as a bad habit. No one in this world is going to be married. There's not a single person who's free from my innocence. I at some level you have
to overlook some things, you have to decide what's most important and what you can overlook. Nobody anyone married is going to be sinless and perfect. So, yeah, that's, that's complicated. But at the end of the day, there's certain base level of compatibility that needs to be there. As long as that's there.
And again, if this son getting value, specifically, parents have not seen it in Islam, I'd love parents who want to hear that. But in Islam, your sons who they marry, the parents have no say in it Islamic, he can marry anyone he wants. Second, third or fourth, two eldest parents, he doesn't have to ask his parents, right. For a woman, the Hanafi madhhab woman also has a lot more freedom to marry who she wants, as long as there's compatibility. The other must have, she needs a father's permission, but in 100, free months, she doesn't technically need information. Right. So again, Islamically supposed to treat them as adults, and respect their choices. At least they making Nikka
and accommodating CINAHL that's, please look at you that way.
What's happened in the case of
dissipated completely
get married to a new OB GYN section. How do you? How do the parents knew that things that's happening in
DC? Completely break ties or hope like they come back? If you're if your children
didn't hear the question?
Okie dokie, non Muslim
going to homosexuality?
This is a tough one, but an important one, right? So what do you do if your children
broaden that devalue a non Muslim they get involved in LGBT stuff? Live a life of Zina or even apostate, right? So these are things that all these things have happened in our community? What do you do as a parent in that case? My advice to every parent I've met to help to deal with their case is always have some always be your child's bridge back to Islam. They if you cut off ties with them, there's there's no reading back to the to Islam, like you did just going all in on that now. Right? Like, for example, your family is on eemaan. That party going down is Cofer. If you cut that bridge, they all on the side of how do they get back on this way. So you'll be very clear that this is
haram, we don't support this, do not expect us to support this, but you are my child, and I'm going to have a child of a parent type relationship with you, I'm going to make dua for you, I'm always going to advise you on this matter. So you maintain that relationship with them. They need your help financially, you're there for them, they need advice, you're there for them. But you make it very clear that this issue I cannot support you. This is haram and I cannot support you in Haram. Right, and you make dua for them, but cutting them off completely. I've never seen that endwell cutting them off completely. I've never seen it and well, that might work in a in a Islamic society. If
you're living in a Muslim country, and someone does something like this, and you cut them off completely, they now become isolated from the whole community. And that might make them think twice. But if you're living in a non Muslim country, and you cut them off, and the rest of society embraces them, they just go all in into Cofer, right. So you have to have some means of being the means of guidance back to the straight part. It's not easy. And Allah protect all of us from ever being in that situation.
We'd have to do we need to have more conversation on those topics, because these are becoming major issues in our community.
But then my advice to parents is be there bridge, maintain a relationship with them. But at the same time never ever be any have any justification for what they're doing? Never ever normalize it ever make them feel like okay, I'm fine with it now, or I'm okay with it. Now, they should always know that this is haram and I don't support it. Right. But doesn't mean you break off hi to them completely.
You have children?
Is it compulsory? No, it's mazahub Highly recommended. So it will be in the sense that
if everyone's adopting this mindset that I'm not going to have children, the Oba is going to decrease one or two people do it as their own business. And it's not the same. Right? So for example, there are some people one who would genuinely not good parenting, right. So they don't want to have children. They know they're not going to be good parents.
It wouldn't be haram to not have children, right on an individual basis. But when you become the societal when it becomes like for example, one generation had five kids, and those five kids, two of them had two kids each and other three never had kids. And then from the next generation, no one's having kids. By the third or fourth generation, the whole family's broken up. It's the lineage is over. Right. That needs to be avoided. But it is highly highly recommended in Islam, to have children
Right. This is like the prophets like some Tanaka who the cursor will get married and have a lot of children. To such an extent that not being able to have children in Islam is considered a test from Allah is consistently Allah is testing a couple of words they can't have children. So if people don't want to have children, I will always ask them first. Why? Why? Why do you sometimes when you young you think you don't want to have children. And when you get old, you're like, oh, I should have had children 10 years ago.
So sometimes it's good to go into the whys, because very often, we're not thinking 20 3040 years ahead, we only thinking about I want to have fun now, or I don't want the responsibility. Now. There are many reasons, and some are good, some are bad. But in general, in Islam, it is highly recommended to get married and to have children. Remember from the five Maqasid of the Sharia is the preservation of family and lineage. That's one of the five big goals of the Sharia preservation of family and lineage. And a lot of our religion revolves around that. And that includes the encouragement to get married and to have children. Right so wouldn't technically be haram but it
wouldn't be encouraged in any way either.
Any other questions?
Okay, here I am, de la Sol, does aka everyone for your time and your attention and your questions. And we ask Allah to allow us to put this knowledge into action and to be able to benefit from this knowledge and to solve our community problems using this knowledge. And Inshallah, in our next session, we will continue with this book into chapter two, which focuses on maintaining family ties, a very crucial topic to our community. Because one of the biggest problems that I deal with all the time in this community is broken family ties, brother is not speaking to each other parents and children are speaking to each other sisters not speaking to each other, it's a major problem in our
community. And we will look at the Hadees on this topic and the advice of the Sahaba on this topic, and use that inshallah to help solve some of our contemporary problems, to tackle the Hadron LaQuita. One
constitutes breaking family ties, if you don't visit somebody or speak to them or, like completely, that's breaking family ties. But if you if they speak to you speak to them, but you don't go out of your way to visit them or make contact with them. That's a good question. So the levels to this, firstly, it depends on how close the relationship is. Right. So for example, if it's like your own children, or parents, or siblings, there should be regular communication. You shouldn't be phoning your mother once a year, right? Or visit your uncle or your grandfather's brother or your cousin's cousin, and you meeting them once every two or three years. And there's no hostility between your
then that's maintaining family ties. So again, it's all about how close the relationship is with people who are very close to you. They should be some constant connection, they should be love. They should be regular visiting and phone calls, that that will be maintaining family ties, the more distant the relationship is, it should this should be no hostility, right? That you don't have any hatred towards that person.
And what really counts is the major sin of bacon family ties. It's like when a parent tells their child you're dead to me, or where a brother tells you, brother, I'm not speaking to you ever again. This is when he becomes a major sir. This is where it's like, now you've crossed that line. You know that that's the majors in line, but where it's just negligence that you forgot to find someone for a few months, that that's now borderline somewhere between macro and minus, right? But when there's the intention of hostility and breaking up with someone, that's when it becomes a major sin, right. So we'll go into that that's actually what's going to be part of what I'm going to cover next time.
So inshallah we'll cover that in more details. In our next session, walk through the Juana and hamdulillahi rabbil Alameen.