In the Name of Allah, Most Merciful, Most Compassionate
Assalaamu alaykum
Dear Friends
I pray that you are well.
It goes without saying that every committed Muslim is supposed to respect his parents, especially his mother, whether they are nice people or not, even if they happened to be non-Muslims.
Respecting one's parents is exhibiting the best possible behavior before one's parents, and includes: taking care of their physical well-being, honoring them, treating them well, acting in the best manner, and making no trouble for the parents.
Dutifulness to parents, especially the mother, and treating them kindly is an act of worship enjoined in both the Qur’an and the Sunnah of the Prophet (Allah bless him and grant him peace). There is a direct correlation between your ability of showing appreciation towards your parents and your ability to show appreciation towards your Creator. If you have a hard time appreciating your parents, who are in the seen, then it is only logical that you also have a hard time appreciating Allah, Who is in the unseen.
Just as worshiping Allah, being dutiful to parents is not confined to a specific time. It is an obligation that should be observed every time, as we all know.
What Islam goes against is to imitate non-Muslims by marking a special occasion such as celebrating the Mother’s Day in a way that shows that mothers do not deserve due respect and care save on this very day. If we are going to make the whole year a Mother’s Day, then Islam welcomes celebrating the occasion with open arms.
Muslim scholars have maintained various opinions regarding the issue.
Shaykh Faysal Mawlawi, Deputy Chairman of the European Council for Fatwa and Research, states in part:
The Mother’s Day implies paying more attention and exerting more effort in expressing gratitude to mothers. So there is nothing wrong in that.
However, there are two reservations worth mentioning; first, considering the Mother’s Day a feast; second, confining the task of showing dutifulness to mothers to that specific day, giving implication that throughout the whole year, just only one day is for showing love to parents. If such two anomalous points are addressed, then there is nothing wrong in considering the Mother’s Day a chance to give more care to mothers.
Thus, we may take the Mother’s Day as a chance to lay more emphasis on our duty towards our mothers, as Islam enjoins us, because dutifulness to parents is a genuine Islamic teaching. But Muslims, in doing that, should never deviate from the Islamic teachings, they should do things in Islamic manners, not in Western manners. Hence, they would not be imitating the non-Islamic habits of the West.
Hence, viewed in juristic perspective, we can say that celebrating the Mother’s day is controversial among the contemporary scholars. While a group of them consider it haram (unlawful) as a kind of blind imitation of the Western non-Islamic habits, which have no benefit for Muslims, another group see it halal(lawful) on condition that showing gratitude and dutifulness to parents should not be confined to that day only.
The well-known erudite scholar Shaykh Yusuf al-Qaradawi states in part:
The Arabs tend to blindly follow the Western in their celebration of the Mother’s Day, without trying to understand the wisdom behind inventing such an occasion.
A Muslim must not allow any gap between him and his mother, he must offer her presents every time. This indicates that Muslims can dispense with such an occasion, the Mother’s Day. Unlike the case in the West, where it’s a vogue for some children to show indifference to their mothers’ feelings, and, what’s more, it is so common to see some parents being dragged to infirmaries (as their kids have no time for them), dutifulness to parents in Islam, alongside with worshiping Allah, is a sacred duty.
وَوَصَّيْنَا ٱلْإِنسَـٰنَ بِوَٰلِدَيْهِ إِحْسَـٰنًا ۖ حَمَلَتْهُ أُمُّهُۥ كُرْهًا وَوَضَعَتْهُ كُرْهًا ۖ وَحَمْلُهُۥ وَفِصَـٰلُهُۥ ثَلَـٰثُونَ شَهْرًا ۚ حَتَّىٰٓ إِذَا بَلَغَ أَشُدَّهُۥ وَبَلَغَ أَرْبَعِينَ سَنَةً قَالَ رَبِّ أَوْزِعْنِىٓ أَنْ أَشْكُرَ نِعْمَتَكَ ٱلَّتِىٓ أَنْعَمْتَ عَلَىَّ وَعَلَىٰ وَٰلِدَىَّ وَأَنْ أَعْمَلَ صَـٰلِحًا تَرْضَىٰهُ وَأَصْلِحْ لِى فِى ذُرِّيَّتِىٓ ۖ إِنِّى تُبْتُ إِلَيْكَ وَإِنِّى مِنَ ٱلْمُسْلِمِينَ ﴿١٥
And We have enjoined upon man, to his parents, good treatment. His mother carried him with hardship and gave birth to him with hardship, and his gestation and weaning [period] is thirty months. [He grows] until, when he reaches maturity and reaches [the age of] forty years, he says, "My Lord, enable me to be grateful for Your favor which You have bestowed upon me and upon my parents and to work righteousness of which You will approve and make righteous for me my offspring. Indeed, I have repented to You, and indeed, I am of the Muslims." (15) [Qur'an, Al-Ahqaf 46:15]
Reflecting on the aforementioned Qur’anic verse, we find it stressing both parents’ right, but reviewing the following verses we find them paying special care to the mother and tackling the hardships she suffers in pregnancy, fosterage and rearing children.
In this verse, Almighty Allah informs man of the debt he owes his mother since he was a fetus, passing by the process of childbirth, infancy, childhood until he comes of age. A child normally forgets the hardship which his mother underwent during pregnancy. Hence Almighty Allah draws his attention to such hardships, laying emphasis on her great status in Islam.
Dr. `Abdul Fattah `Ashoor, Professor of Qur’an Exegisis at Al-Azhar University, concludes,
Holding celebrations in honoring others and commemorating anniversaries are neither feasts nor Islamic. But one may seize any chance to express gratitude to those who deserve it. This is how we should consider the Mother’s Day. The mother has a special place in the Islamic culture, and all other civilized cultures. So it is something good to do anything to please her and show gratefulness to her.
So dedicating a day to showing good feelings towards parents, especially the mother, is by no means blameworthy as it does not contradict the Islamic teachings, nor can it be merely considered a form of joining the Western vogue of making celebrations. Conversely, it is a kind of devotion to Allah’s orders that we should be dutiful to our parents.
Whether you want to follow the position of it being halal or haram, ask yourself this question first...is what I am going to do will bring me closer to Allah or further away from Allah. Be honest with your answer. In the end you are the one who is going face Allah with your deeds.
May Allah guide us and enable us to be dutiful to our parents. Ameen.
Allah Almighty knows best.
Wassalaam
Related Archive
Your Mother, Your Mother, Your Mother
No comments:
Post a Comment