Living Islam – Raising a Muslim Child #12

Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim Al hamdu Lillahi Rabbil Alameen wa Salatu was Salam ala shuffelin ba will mousseline Muhammad Rasulullah sallallahu ala you right? It was, so you send them to Stephen cathedra. And

I've had all my brothers and sisters, we are on the raising a Muslim child

living Islam series.

I want to talk to you about the importance of surah. But of the company of elders.

And this is the primary

company for a child is that of their parents. And unfortunately, in today's world, in our frantic, and frankly, completely idiotic lifestyles, that is the one thing that our children are deprived of. Because parents think that their job, their primary job is to make money. And to throw this money had the children

instead of giving them the benefit of their company, this has two problems. One is that it frees the parents from the mentally freeze, doesn't actually freeze, but it mentally frees them from the responsibility of upgrading themselves, their own knowledge, their understanding, and to look at and seek to continue to be sources of inspiration for their children. Just think about the time I'm sure every one of us has seen this. Take a little two year olds. I'm saying boy here because he's very explicit with males.

Take a two year old boy and see how he looks at his father.

For that two year old boy, his father is the word. His father is the best his father is a Superman. Right, the father may may may look like a dried shrimp, it doesn't matter for the tutorial by that father is his whole word. And he will imitate his father, he will walk like the father, he will try to dress like the father, he will want to be with the Father the whole time.

Then ask yourself this question that what happens to the same child

10 years down the road when he's 12

or 15 years down the road? or 20 years down the road?

Right? What happens in China? How does a generation gap

happen?

How does it happen? Is it the fault of the children? Or is it the fault of the parents?

In my view, it is the fault of the parents because of two reasons. Firstly,

it is the role.

It is the

role, the job the responsibility of the parents to continue to be inspirational figures in the lives of their children. Therefore, the responsibility is on your shoulders. So ask yourself What have you done?

To continue to be for that little boy who's now 15? Who's now 20?

What have you done to continue to be for that little boy, what you were like for him when he was two?

The sad unfortunate answer that most people have is that you've done nothing.

Because when I talk to people, I'm talking about adults, people in their 30s in their 40s in their 50s. And if I ask them what books are you reading? They're not

no books.

Those who are religious will read some Quran ritualistically.

Most don't understand what they read, including Arabs, because most adults don't speak classical Arabic they don't speak.

They speak whichever dialect that they speak. Whether it is you know Egyptian, Lebanese or whatever.

So they do not understand.

They don't understand classical Arabic which is what is what the Quran is.

And of course the rest of us non Arabs, they don't understand. And as we have learned Arabic

We don't read.

So what do we do?

We work

every day,

day and night because we have convinced ourselves that we are the

the results

of the of our families.

We don't want to look at the fact that we are the means through which Allah subhanaw taala provides them support.

When have you heard that a father drop dead and the whole family drop dead with him?

Never.

In many cases, the family actually does better financially speaking after the Father's Day because they get help.

From so many other people, I'm not saying everywhere all the time but you know, this happens in enough number of times for us to understand that it's not the father or the mother, who is this, who's the provider of risk? It is Allah, Allah Allah.

What is our responsibility? What is it that I will be held accountable for and that is the third year of my children.

So that we as a function of contract with elders in age and knowledge,

let us be very, very clear in our minds,

that no matter how

wonderful you think,

if 15 or 16, or 17, or 18, or 19 year old or 20 year old is

they simply do not have the breadth of experience and the wisdom to learn lessons from what they

experience in life, to be able to impart that as useful worthwhile knowledge to somebody else.

Why do you think Allah subhanaw taala did not give any of the Gambia the Woolworth at

the Gambia had been chosen, as soon as an asylum was a dubby. Before all of creation good this was in the realm of Allah subhanaw taala. But also as a result of when he was born.

On day one, he was born as the Navi. The Ward had not been given to him, but he was then every it's not as if suddenly one day Allah subhanaw taala decides, Okay, I'm going to choose this one no.

So also Musa al Islam, so also is that as everybody?

But why is it that Allah subhanaw taala at a particular point says that we give them el mundo Hickman

to give them knowledge and wisdom, meaning that they were given the words and what was that age that is almost everywhere, if not everywhere, was 40.

It was not 20 it was not 15.

Children need the company of wise adults.

So we must focus on becoming why wise adults

we must focus on becoming wise adults.

And that doesn't happen for us it is waste are going to come. So we have to make ourselves wise.

So by submission do the parents who are listening to this

read

I don't care what you read but read to get into the habit of reading.

And after that, read things which are interesting, but with from which you learn great lessons.

I just bought an entire set of books

by one of my favorite authors.

And that whole series is 26 books.

And I just finished reading 16 of them. They were another than 10 to go

and I finished reading those 16 books

in two months.

And I didn't stop by work.

I am did I did all that plus all that I do.

I'm not trying to show you that I was overwhelmed. I'm just saying that the same 24 hours you also have

it's how you structure your time. What do you do with your time?

What do you do with I can chase wealth just like anybody else. And hamdulillah I've got the qualifications to do that I did it for a long time in my life.

I don't do it anymore.

convince yourself that Allah subhanaw taala is a daffodil coated Mutti. Allah did not tell you to chase wealth to chase money, so that you can eat allotted I will feed you with my strength my power.

Allah has written for us what is written for us the quantum of it is not going to change. But what we will be questioned about is where I where I earned it from and where I spent.

The amount of time we have is written is not going to change. But we will be asked what we did with that time. And part of that time has to do with spending that time with our children. So therapy as a function of contact with elders in age and in knowledge and experience. Children need teachers. My very first teacher was my mother,

grandmother malaria. I remember how she would hold my hand and lead me out into the night when the moon was full.

And we will sit together on the doorstep and look at the beauty of the full moon.

At that time, we lived in a

small village in North Canada In Canada

About Sirsi

near a place called homely.

And electricity was in short supply to a little village. So most of the time our house was dark. And we had no, I mean the light bulbs were there, but there was no there was no current. So the light was from kerosene lanterns.

There were no streetlights. And the forest was always near because we use a small village surrounded by some very beautiful, thick forest. And that means that there was very little ambient light and the full glory of the Moon was visible.

On dark nights, the sky was dotted with stars like diamonds had been scattered. My mother would say to me, you look at the moon graduates agenda.

You talk of sort of

your alert Kima lo que

alized Obernai

Surah Scooby Levana

use was the hum Allah keyword karte John Kiyosaki by the naked

who's what made you well those are

my brothers to say look at them. See how beautiful it is?

Isn't it beautiful?

This is a creation of Allah.

Creation of Allah creature of

the Sun is a creation of Allah.

That is why we worship Allah subhanaw taala alone and we do not worship the sun

this combination between mother and son is happening when when I was two years old.

My mother talked to me like an adult she never talked to me in baby talk. Cotabato kind of thing never did

you talk to me like an adult.

And really me and my mother my mother didn't read any raising children blogs on the internet. I'm quite I'm quite amused because some of these blogs are written by young ladies we're not even married. You're advising people how to raise children

but we live in an insane world so you know

if you do not have experience the best thing you can do with yourself is to shut your mouth and get experience

and that is why I see a lot of young mothers for example completely misled

feeding their children on gardeners what you know cactus flowers are

all good all kinds of stuff and oh, this is good for them. That's good for them the How did you get raised.

To come back to this my mother would point out all sorts of small things.

birds and flowers and sunrises and sunsets and she would say the same thing, the glory of Allah's Valentine.

My mother taught me to read Quran.

She didn't teach me the rule of thirds, but

she just taught me how to read. And she did it correctly.

She would sit we had a big

she had a big mess of

big letters, and black writing on a green background and others to say that green background is cool on the eyes.

So she would sit in the in on the floor on the carpet with the rial and the Quran in the in the in the stand. And

to get me to come and sit next to her and she will teach me so she started with the neurologia and then after once I knew that she would teach me and I will recite that remember I was two I was three.

I was four. So this happened for a number of years.

And I was

very active.

And I couldn't sit in one place for a long time. And my other thing was at least one page I must reach that's 15 lines.

So I will read one line may not even complete the i i will read one and then I will get up and I will run away

she never stopped me she never called me she never called me back. But she also never left her place.

She continue to sit there

so I would run on a play. And we were we had

both in my ancestral home as well and as well as where we used to live with gypsy and so on.

The the the living rooms, you know, they opened out into a big gun. So I would run out outside

and I would play I would go do whatever I did and then I would Sunday. I guess I would feel guilty of you know why my mom was just sitting there. So I would come back on my own.

And I would sit and she I would start from wherever I was reading and I will read for another couple of lines.

And this would repeat in I would run away.

She never forced me she never called me back. She never told me Don't run away. She never brought

I wish she didn't say for city I will give you a sweet No.

She just stayed. She held the position for me.

And when I will reset, she would say do it loudly, loudly

that the birds here, let the air here let the trees here all have the will bear witness for you on the Day of Judgment

that you were reciting the cadaver

then

she would tell me stories

or the stories that she told me were not some you know, olive Leila kind of stories, fuzzy, made up stories. No, these were the stories of the prophets in the corner.

So now when I'm when I'm doing the, the series of which you guys are watching, called Lessons from the lies of the Gambia, I remember my mother and may Allah subhanaw taala give her the reward for this.

She told me the stories from the Quran

of the lives of the available Salah.

So by the time I was maybe six, I had heard every story of every prophet, which Allah subhanaw taala mentioned in the Quran.

So all the MBL mo CERAM are real, they were real to me. They were not, you know, Story characters. They were real to me.

Now, not only did I know the stories, but I was used to considering my own actions in terms of their lives. And that's how my mother taught me. She told me the names of the of the prophets, Allah Salem, names of the Emilio Salaam and then she would say we were able to gather at wherever Islam had done this, what would you do?

So it would be something which was very interactive, which was very, you know, connecting to the stories of the Umberto is not just a story

the name of Allah and the name of Rasul Allah Azza wa sallam were part of normal conversation in our home.

We didn't have a special session to talk about the greatness of one that we this was a novel condition with my mother would would talk about that

my father would lead us in South Africa we live very far from

from any budget so all but we prayed all the Salah by Gemma at home.

I will call the mother and my father will lead us in Salah

in Ramadan. We will go my father would take me and my brother to Tara.

So we will go for a shot.

Now in Hyderabad we were living in South Africa and we would come for Asia antara v2

visa imagine imagine visa which didn't pan out.

And those days I mean this was I'm talking about the 60s and 70s we are when we drove from Santa Monica to the magic visa we would probably pass maybe two or three cars in that whole trip. They were not happy it was not their

budget visa had a it was a very beautiful or budget

had a cold stone floor

on which was a paper thin

was a praying mat

so if you got early if you got there early you got to stand on his mat if you got there late. It was the stone floor all the way. I don't know why we didn't carry our own masala good nobody seemed to do that. In those days we went to the masjid you know when we prayed wherever we could pray.

There was one very small bulb which would give whatever means of illumination.

Whatever illumination it could give, so we prayed in almost seven darkness.

The Imam would recite the Quran in the novel Indian or subcontinental fashion at great speed. We didn't understand one word but we stood in silence.

It stood in silence. At that time I was about eight My brother was six

on special occasions, and this will be different nights and whatnot whatnot in another hour Other than that, we will go to listen to lectures by scholars.

Now these would invariably happen after Isha Salah because this was not even today it's a bad practice. May Allah protect us from this? There are solar cells that have told us after Isha go to sleep, but we start functioning after Isha.

So but that's how it was. That's how it was. That's our students. So we these lectures would start after Isha salah and the norm was

that the lecture had to be at least three hours.

If the scholars spoke for less than three hours, people were dissatisfied people would say, you know, they didn't get their money's worth. And nobody had money. Those days, people did it for free. But I'm just saying, you know, this was the, so it was usually three hours, so almost until midnight, so Salah normally is around nine o'clock. So then this would go on to almost

all the time, we would sit quietly on the score, stone floor, was gradually warmed with our bodies, our eyes fixed on the speaker.

It didn't even occur to us to complain, or that not going with a choice. Our father went, we were his sons. So we accompanied him.

In later years, I recall vividly the IRS that I heard during those lectures,

the Muslim hotbar, the hotbar, which I seldom

I never read it.

I memorized it, just by listening to the

different hotel, the different hardships, who I listen to in my childhood.

lectures were interesting, they would give us some lessons, we learned that after the lecture was over, then we will usually have a leisurely cup of tea with my father's friends. And sometimes the scholar whose speech we had just heard our job my brother and I was to say salah, and to see him Please sit quietly, silently and listen.

If something had to be brought taken away, and so on, this was our job. Go for this, go for that. But that also was you know, okay, well, you're busy.

Otherwise, we just had a listen.

I cannot tell you how valuable and beneficial those hours were for our education.

Most of what we heard initially went over our heads. But gradually, as we grew up,

we understood and ended up with a worldview and perspective on life, which was far ahead of our age.

The combination that I was driving to range from global global politics, Palestine was an issue even then,

to test cricket, to the antics of our politicians. My father's greatest desire was to go and work in his field, as a doctor in Palestine,

may Allah reward him for is the didn't have it didn't never happen. But that was his he would always tell us

he would tell us about the history of Palestine. And to the end of his days, he would pray for the Palestinians and the Alaska Aleksa. In in his title,

we would all sit together as a family and listen to the news on the radio.

My father relied faithfully or two radio stations, BBC World Service, and the Voice of America.

But those were the days when journalist still spoke the truth and journalism and not degenerated into the corporate propaganda that it has become. And Islam was always a part of these conversations.

My father loved the word of Allah Akbar.

And he knew literally hundreds of Russia

by memory,

so he would sit with us. My mother shared his knowledge, and she's a poet, she was a poet herself.

So he would sit with us and he would recite poetry and explain a love and Valhalla these concepts to us.

This was

five of us.

ranging in age from maybe 12, or

14, which was I'm the oldest,

don't do the little one.

I've had this relations. My father's explanations would include the meaning and how what a world of law he wrote about, reflected in present day society, and the politics of Muslims.

That was an education in itself just sitting and listening to him.

literature and poetry are great ways to gain perspective on life.

And my father's generation use them to their fullest extent.

To be able to quote, appropriate poetry in letters in formal speeches and ordinary composition was a sign of having a good education.

Farsi was all was often the language of choice and quoting poetry and proverbs of Sadie Ghazali. Rumi had to live with me amazing words of wisdom that speak across the centuries.

And underlying that knowledge. The value of that has no bound has no bounds. Islam to us

At that time when I was growing up, did not did not only mean going to the masjid but being able to interpret all of our everyday living in the light of the Quran, the Sunnah, and the acquired the sayings of the wise people.

In retrospect, I recall that there were almost no discussions on thick

on issues of haram and or differences in between the mother,

my mother's family, the family is mostly Shafi because my great grandfather, now versus the Mahabharata Lolly is this. His title was Shamsul Oliver. And he was a Mufti and a great chef is called

my father's side are all Hanafi.

But there was absolutely I've never heard in my entire childhood, I've never heard one word of criticism, or one word of difference of opinion, between the Chava and the mother, even though my maternal grandfather, grandmother, uncles, all these were Shafik, my, my paternal my father, my grandfather, and so on with all no one ever had any

algae.

But there were numerous discussions and reminders about the greatness of Allah subhanaw taala, about Islamic history about the sera fossa Salaam and the Sahaba, the lives of the MBL in the Sudan, and also about our own family, about our own family and our elders, many of whom were scholars.

Some of them were not scholars, but they were, I mean, the meaning of them were not scholars in,

in Islamic education in Islamic way, but they were scholars in you know, of different kinds. My father himself was medical doctor, and so on. So they talked about experience, they talked about life experience, they talked about what they did.

They talk about the surface on here, and they talked about the sahaba.

They talked about the earlier gram they

through throughout my childhood, as I was growing up all of these names

were and were as familiar to me as the names today. It's a horrible comparison. I don't compare it in that way at all. But truly like, just like today, for example,

the names of soccer players, football players, basketball players, cricket players and whatnot and worse.

Bollywood Hollywood icons,

just as their names and lives are familiar to our children today.

Whose fault is it?

Whose fault is it? If you are going to sit down and watch Superbowl for three hours with your children,

all party please do that no problem. But ask yourself

how many hours you spend with your children talking about the MBR livezilla talking about the Sahaba talking about the son of the salary data into what I've been

talking about the great Imam Islam talking about the great scholars of Islam, talking about the great

the inventors and the and the scientist and so on and so forth.

How many hours

seven not trying to make. I don't watch I do not watch sports. I think it's a waste of time.

At the worst and the best and worst it's a type of time wasted not just in time but in terms of reflect.

Sports will be played, not watched. You play sport, it's good for your health. You watch sport, that stupid.

The only people who should watch sport are people who play a sport professionally so that they can watch other great professionals doing it the right way and so on. But for ordinary run of the mill, garden lizard varieties like me,

go play the sport.

Whatever sport it is

appropriate to your age go play the sport. Don't waste your time watching sport.

Talk about the greatness of Allah. Talk about Sassoon Allah is on Sunday. Talk about the akhirah

don't talk about fake Messiah. You don't know if your Messiah most of us

the only create divisions and

and discord between people. Learn the masala for yourself. Apply it on yourself. As far as anybody else is concerned they are not your problem. Leave them alone.

As far as applying the masala, learning the filter of life or yourself.

Apply it with the context of Taqwa of Allah subhanaw taala. Don't look for loopholes. Don't look for the LCM Least Common LCD least common denominator.

minimum required no try to

Do the most try to please Allah subhanaw taala and say what can I do more? I don't need to do that. But I would like to do that because Allah subhanaw taala likes it.

These attitudes and this will happen in your children if they are if that is happening in yourself.

Ask a lot of our intelligent people to help us to really understand this deal and to benefit from this deal. While we still have a chance.

Well, sallallahu alayhi wa ala alihi wa sahbihi. Remember what the government said our economy