The Mahdi Between Fact and Fiction

Reference: Quran 20:132

Make sure that you establish the salah amongst your family, not just yourself. You are mashaAllah good Muslim, your family is not praying, you're not a good Muslim. If your family is not practicing Islam and you don't care about it, you are not a good Muslim. Allah is commanding our Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم) make sure that you command your family to pray. And be patient as you command them to pray.

The Consequences of Neglect

Those who don't take advantage of this, those who ignore their responsibilities of being a mother and a father. Allah (سبحانه وتعالى) says, the worst of losers on the day of judgment:

"Indeed, the losers are the ones who will lose themselves and their families on the Day of Resurrection"

The worst of losers are those who lost themselves and their families. These are the real losers. Neither did you care about yourself, nor did you care about your families.

Stories of Father-Son Relationships in the Quran

So brothers and sisters, let us take advantage of all of these verses of the Quran. And one thing that's really interesting to me, there are so many stories about children in the Quran. So many motifs of father-son relationships. So many stories that we can benefit from. I wanna go over just briefly some of these stories, not in detail, just to give you a list so that then you can go home and read up these stories.

Ibrahim as a Young Man with His Father

The first of these stories, the story of Ibrahim as a young man with his own father. The story of Ibrahim as a young man with his own father. When he tells his father:

"O my father, why do you worship that which does not hear and does not see and will not benefit you at all?"

Reference: Quran 19:42

Oh my dear father, how can you worship an idol? Oh my dear father, why are you acting in this way? Oh my dear father:

"O my father, indeed there has come to me of knowledge that which has not come to you"

Reference: Quran 19:43

I have been given knowledge that you have not been given. So listen to me, and Allah will save you, and Allah will show mercy to you.

Now this is interesting, in that, scholars have said, what type of da'wah is this? When a man boasts of his knowledge to somebody else. That's not a very good way of giving da'wah, typically speaking. If I were to stand in front of you today, Oh listen to me, I'm more knowledgeable than you. That's not modesty and humbleness. That's not something that will want you to listen to me.

People of knowledge should be humble. And yet Ibrahim is telling, in the Quran, Ibrahim is telling his father, I have knowledge, you don't have. The scholars explain this, this is really interesting.

The Unique Love of a Parent

And they say, Ibrahim is giving the best da'wah to his father. Why? Because, the only type of love on the face of the earth, in which you want somebody to be better than you, the only type of love, in which you want object of love to be better than you, more famous than you, more knowledgeable than you, more powerful than you, is the love that a father has for his son, or the mother has for her daughter. There is no other type of love on earth.

You can love your brother, you can love your spouse, you can love your friend, you will not want that person to be way better than you. There's always gonna be some jealousy, there's always gonna be some stigma. But it is only the father, that as the sun rises, he will feel proud. That's my son over there. He is our son. Right? That attitude, of this being my son, Ibrahim is using that.

And he says, Oh father, you have raised me in this manner. Allah has now chosen me. So he is praising his father by praising his knowledge. He is praising his father by praising his knowledge. Because the father takes all the credits of the son. So he is telling his father, I have reached a level that you have not reached. And this would instill pride in a typical father, as you know Ibrahim's father refused to accept that advice.

Ibrahim with His Son Ismail

Later on in life, Ibrahim with his son Ismail. And I want those of you with teenagers or those whose children are not yet teenagers to especially pay attention to this. Ibrahim (عليه السلام) sees in a dream, you all know the story, that he has to sacrifice Ismail. And he knows this is a commandment from Allah. He knows he must listen to this commandment. Tie his son up and go ahead and sacrifice him.

What does he do? Does he sneak into his teenager son's room and tie him up quickly and then grab him and drag him outside? Does he trick him, and cajole him? No. He engages in a very mature intellectual conversation. He treats his teenage son like an adult.

And wallahi, I will speak to you from experience, that when you treat a teenager like an adult, he'll start acting like an adult. And when you treat a teenager like a kid, well then it's not his fault he never grew up. You never allowed him to grow up.

Treating Children with Respect

You never allowed him to grow up. Ibrahim (عليه السلام) goes to his teenage son, and he tells him the bare facts. He tells him exactly the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. And he says:

"O my son, indeed I have seen in a dream that I [must] sacrifice you, so see what you think"

Oh son, Allah has shown me a dream where I'm sacrificing you. What do you think I should do? What's your opinion on the matter? This is what you call تربية You trust your son. You know that this is a son you have raised. You know that your son believes in Allah, believes in the commandments of Allah, and you approach him man to man.

So he asks his son, What's your advice? I ask you by Allah, when's the last time you asked your teenage son for any advice? Even though Ibrahim didn't need his son's advice, he's gonna do what Allah wants him to do, right? It's not as if Ismail said, No, he would say, I'm sorry, I can't do it, O Allah. But he's asking him because this is proper تربية

Islamic Concept of Maturity

Allah tells us in the Quran that if you're taking care of orphans, and these orphans are not even your own sons, you're taking care of orphans, make sure you test and try them until they reach adulthood. And when you sense from them maturity, give their money to them. If Allah commands us to test orphans for their maturity, how about our own children? How about our own children?

And this is my opinion, is one of the biggest problems of raising children in the West, there's this period called adolescence. There's this period called teenage years, where you're neither an adult nor are you a child. Islamically speaking, when you hit 14 or 15, you are an adult. Islamically speaking, when you hit puberty, you are a full-fledged adult. You are required to be a full practicing Muslim. All the commandments of Allah are now obligatory and binding upon you.

Unfortunately in our society, until you're 18, 19, you're still considered to be an adolescence. So you treat a mature intellectual being like a kid, of course he's gonna pretend to be a kid. He's gonna act like a kid, and he will not be mature. You're forcing a shell on him that he doesn't need.

The sahabah would push their children forward. The sahabah would give them responsibilities. The sahabah would want their kids to go beyond their years. And when they treated them like adults, they began to act like adults. Similarly in the story of Ibrahim (عليه السلام). So we saw when he was a teenager. We saw when he became an adult.

Ibrahim's Final Question to His Children

Then at the time of death, what did he tell his children? What are you gonna worship after me?

"What will you worship after me?"

Him and Ya'qub, they're both in the same frame of mind. They want to know the theology. Have I been a good Muslim father to you? Have I taught you this religion properly? And all of them say:

"We will worship your God and the God of your forefathers before you, Ibrahim and Ismail and Ishaq, one God"

We will worship your God and the God of your forefathers before you, Ibrahim and Ishaq, and the rest of them after that.

The Story of Luqman

As for the story of Luqman, there's no time to go into detail. But the story of Luqman is the longest story in the Quran that deals with the father-son relationship in a direct manner. The story of Luqman and his advice that he gave to his son. One page long in the Quran. This is a gem. It's a jewel. Every parent should listen to these stories recited. Every parent should read up the tafsir of this particular surah. Every parent should understand the advice of Luqman. I don't have time to go into detail. I have given a longer lecture just about this story, the advice of Luqman to his son.

Luqman's Comprehensive Advice

But to summarize in a nutshell, look at what advice Luqman gave to his son. Number one, he taught him the religion. He taught him, make sure you worship Allah alone. Don't worship any other object or entity. Number two, he taught him to be respectful to his parents. The rights of the parents. Number three, he taught him to be conscious of Allah. Wherever you are, even if you hide something under a rock, Allah knows you're doing that.

He didn't teach him the minutiae. He taught him the broad morality. You can't hide your sins. He didn't go into detail. He didn't beat him over every single infraction. He instilled in him the overall consciousness that a mu'min, a muhsin has of Allah. Allah is always watching you. No matter what you do, you can hide it from me, you can hide it from your mother. You cannot hide it from Allah.

He moves on and he tells him to be establishing of the salah. He tells him to be active in communal work, social obligations, command what is good, forbid what is evil. And he tells him to have humility and perfect manners.

In this one simple paragraph of eight sentences, Luqman emphasizes every single relationship possible. Relationship between man and God, relationship between man and parents, relationship between man and society, relationship between man and self. Amazing story. And I want every parent to go home and concentrate on these stories.

Ibn al-Qayyim's Insight on Parenting

Ibn al-Qayyim, the famous scholar of Islam. Ibn al-Qayyim says that the greatest cause of a man going astray is that his parents did not take care of him and neglected him. The greatest cause of a man going astray, he says, عامة, the general cause of people going astray is that if you look at their childhood, their parents did not do a good job of raising them.

And he says, and Ibn al-Qayyim is writing this in 750 Hijrah, more than 800 years ago. Wallahi, it's as if he's writing for our civilization. He says, you find a parent loving the child in a manner that is harmful to the long term of that child. He thinks that he's being caring and loving. In reality, he's being harmful and deceitful. He cares for the dunya and not for the deen.

Ibn al-Qayyim is writing for an audience 800 years ago. And it's as if he's reading the majority of our minds. You find a loving parent, think they're doing the best for their son or daughter. But in reality, in the long term, they are doing the worst. How do they do that? By concentrating on the dunya at the expense of the deen. By concentrating on the secular world at the expense of the religious world.

The Joy of Righteous Children

Remember, brothers and sisters, remember, that of the greatest blessings of having children is that life becomes sweet. And even death and after death becomes sweet. And that is why Allah says that children are an adornment of this world. Nothing, nothing brings more pleasure to our hearts. Those of us who are parents, we know this. Nothing brings more pleasure to our hearts than seeing our children happy.

Our children will not understand until they become parents. You can drill it in their heads, that's fitra. Until they become parents, they will not understand. But we as parents, we know that the greatest joy of life is to see a smile on our child's face. To see the accomplishments of our children. And the greatest joy of the next life as well is exactly the same thing.

The Lasting Benefit of Righteous Children

You all know the famous hadith of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم in which he said:

(Source Name)

"When a person dies, all of his good deeds are cut off except for three things: ongoing charity, beneficial knowledge, or a righteous offspring who makes dua for him"

Reference: Sahih Muslim Hadith 1631

A righteous offspring continues to make dua for his mother or father. This is one of the blessings of having invested in your children the deen and the dunya. That even when you're dead, when you're rotting in the grave, still hasanat will be coming.

There is a hadith in which it is said that, a man in his grave sees his hasanat increasing. And so he asks Allah, Oh Allah, where are these hasanat coming from? And he is told, these are the good deeds of your children. These are the duas of your children. These are the tarbiyah that you have given to your children. You are still benefiting from them even in your afterlife.

Families Together in Jannah

And that is why Allah praises families in the Quran:

"And those who believed and whose descendants followed them with faith - We will join with them their descendants"

Reference: Quran 52:21

Allah says, them and their spouses will enter jannah. They raise their children in that iman. Their children also have iman. Allah says, we will bless their children and the parents to be together in jannah even if one of the two are lesser than the other.

In other words, if the children are not to the level of the parents, but you've done your job and you're righteous children, Allah says, they will all be together in jannah. Vice versa, if you do a good job and your child turns out better than you, then insha'Allah, you will taste the rewards of that. You will taste the rewards of that in the hereafter where your level in jannah will rise just because your child turned out better than you and you had a part to play in that.

Practical Guidelines for Islamic Parenting

Think about that brothers and sisters. We're increasing our chances of entering jannah. We're increasing our chances of getting to high levels of jannah when we invest our time in our children.

And that is why, that is why the Qur'an and sunnah has come with basic guidelines. There's not a checklist, do this, do this, do this. It has come with basic guidelines that you do the best to raise your children in a proper manner.

Teaching Prayer and Fasting

Establish the prayer when they're young. Between 7 and 10, make sure that they begin to pray. And start them with the Islamic rulings. Of course it becomes obligatory when they hit puberty. But the sahaba would even have their young children fast the hot month of Ramadan. Even when they were 6-7 years old, the sahaba would have their children fast Ramadan.

And they said in Sahih Bukhari, they said that when they would cry for hunger, they would give them some toys. They would give them some distractions in order to force them to try to fast. How many amongst us? Now of course, this goes to the age and the capability of the child.

Reference: Sahih Bukhari Hadith 1960

In our times, if the child is enthused, if the child is interested, and 8, 9, 10 years old, I think this is a very healthy time to have them start fasting. And I can tell you from my own experiences that the first fast that I ever did was when I was 6 years old. And after that when I was 7, up until this year, alhamdulillah, every single year I've been fasting basically the entire month from the age of 7. And I didn't find any difficulty in that.

Balance in Love and Discipline

Many times our love for our children, a smothering love, is actually detrimental for them. If we really want their good, we need to think long term. We all know that we don't give our children sweets whenever they want it. We all know that when there's Pepsi or Coke, we don't just let them drink unabashedly, we monitor it, we check it. But we don't seem to realize that the same applies for this religion as well. We can't just let them go wild, do whatever they want. We have to monitor, we have to give them in doses.

And of course, every parent and every family has to look at what is best, when should one be strict, when should one be loving.

Personal Example from the Speaker

And I just like to conclude, I just like to conclude really, talking a little bit about my own personal upbringing. And the reason I bring this in is because a lot of people come and ask me, how can we have our child go down your path? And astaghfirullah, I'm not somebody worthy of emulation, I'm not somebody that people should look up to. I know my sins and Allah (عز وجل) knows my sins. But people

come and they ask me, how did you get to this path that you are, where you combine between deen and dunya, you have degrees in this and that.

How did you do that? And to me, the answer automatically, instantaneously is always been the same. And it's because of that answer that I mention this. It's not because of me. The answer is very simple. Allah blessed me with a set of parents that are unbelievable. Allah blessed me with parents, the tarbiyah that they gave me, the upbringing that I had.

The Role of Environment

And many of you know my parents, Dr. M.U. Qazi and Alia Qazi, they're active with IKNA, they have been active since the very beginning of the days of the jamaat. And they have authored many books and what not. My father keeps on reminding me really that he gave up a lot for us because he wants us to appreciate that.

And he tells me that as soon as he got his PhD, and he had a very good and lucrative offer here in America, he decided to leave and go to Jeddah and take up a teaching position there even though the pay was one-fifth of what they were paying him. He goes for one reason, I wanted you to have a pure environment. I wanted my children to be in a pure environment and to be raised in an environment where they didn't have to worry about drugs and promiscuity.

Consistency in Prayer

And as a young child, my father always instructed us to pray. He always instructed us to pray. I never once remember a time in my life when I was not praying. Never once. I don't even have memories of a time when I was not praying. And I know when elders come and they meet me and they remind me of stories.

Recently an elder came and goes, you know I visited you when you were seven years old. I visited a family friend of mine when you were seven years old. And you had come back from a long trip, he told me. And you were sleeping in the car. Your father picked you up. Instead of putting you to bed, he woke you up and he said, do wudu and pray Salatul Isha.

He goes, I remember that and I was shocked because I wouldn't do that with my own son. I wouldn't do that with my own son. I don't remember the story but my family friend tells me that when you were seven years old, he woke you up and he told you to go pray Isha. It's memories like this that have shaped who I am.

Daily Quran Reading

I never remember a day in my life when my mother and father did not read the Quran. Never remember a single day in my life. My father started a family halaqa. That's me, my mother and my father. That's it. A

family halaqa. Every day we would sit down after Salatul Isha for five, ten minutes and go over the Quran. I was a teenager.

Wallahi I know how I thought of that back in the day. Do you think I was enthused? Do you think I wanted to do that? Of course I didn't. I wanted to watch TV. I wanted to go play with my friends. But nonetheless, he was firm and insistent. And it was those days of reading the Quran that gave me an interest more and more in knowledge.

Creating an Islamic Environment

My father always had a library and he would bring academic books of Islam and have them. And he would bring me to halaqa. He brought me to IKNA. He brought me to all of these conventions. And he never forced anything on me. That upbringing, that upbringing had a psychological impact on me. Such that when I became free, when I left the family nest, when I could do whatever I wanted to, I only wanted to do that which was Islamic, walhamdulillah.

Setting Boundaries

My father never ever purchased a VCR player. You guys know what VCR is. The younger kids have no idea what it is, right? You guys remember the VCR, the old technology, right? I begged him. I pleaded him. He says, No. I don't want you to live that type of lifestyle. And he refused to do that. He never allowed us to play music in the house. Even though he didn't forbid it in that manner. But I knew that if I were to do it, I would face the anger of my father.

So, I have to admit, he's not here in the audience, so I can praise him as much as he wants, and I can talk about my own sins. When I would want to listen to music back in the day, I'd have to turn the radio on really low and be very quiet to it. Because I knew that if my father heard, he wouldn't like it. And I felt so guilty doing that.

Memorizing the Quran

Nonetheless, that type of tarbiyah, where you're firm and yet loving. And similarly, he put me on the path to memorize the Qur'an. I was 13, 14 years old. He goes, No, you must memorize the Qur'an. I'm going to get somebody, you give the conditions, whatever you want to do. If you don't want to go to a madrasa, that's fine. I'll get the imams for you here. You want to do it at this time or that time, you don't want to take a break from school. He was very accommodating, but he was still firm. You must memorize the Qur'an.

Do you think I was happy at that stage? Wallahi, I'll tell you this, I was crying and begging. I don't want to memorize the Qur'an. Why are you forcing this on me? I want to go out and play, and all my friends are playing with their bikes and whatnot. Why should I be stuck at home? But he was firm, he was never strict,

he was firm, and he wouldn't budge. He goes, you put the conditions, but you're going to memorize the Qur'an.

To this day, I stand in infinite debt to my father. One of the greatest blessings that he did was that he requested and he guided me to memorize the Qur'an by the blessings of Allah.

The Key Principle

My point being, realize that your love for your child has to transcend secular world. It has to be religious. And that is the ultimate blessing you can give. You know what? I have never seen a case where a father raised a family in an Islamic environment with gentleness. This is the key. Because if you're too strict, then the son can backlash. Yes.

I have never seen the case where the father has raised a family with Islamic values, except that eventually, the child grows up and comes back to Islam. What do I mean by eventually? I mean that yes, I have seen, met a lot of my friends, a lot of my peers, when they go out of the family house, they finally get 2022, they can leave. They go down a path that is not good for a few years.

But what happens then? Reality kicks in. And they remember their own upbringing. And they remember how their own mother and father were. And so when they get married, and when they have children, they don't have any other model to emulate. They don't have any other system to bring forth other than the model of their mother and father. So even if they go astray for a period of time, because their parents were good, because their parents were meticulous, because their parents were good Muslims, eventually, they too were forced to become good Muslims.

Final Message

I conclude by giving you a simple reality. It is so profound and yet so simple. If you're gonna talk the talk, but not walk the walk, if you're gonna tell them to be good, but you're not going to be good yourselves, then wallahi, you are nothing less than hypocrites. And your children will see through that immediately. And as soon as they leave the nest, they have nothing to keep them in place.

But if you're gonna talk the talk and walk the walk, if you're going to live up to the ideals of Islam, if you're going to be a good Muslim in your relationship with yourself, with Allah, with your wife, with your spouse, if you give them the model of good Islam, then even if they go astray temporarily, even if they go astray for a period of time, in the long run, it is simply impossible that they don't come back to this. Why? Because you have left them the best example. And deep down, they know that.

I have many parents come to me, they're crying, what can we do? Our son is doing that, our daughter is doing that. You know what? You've heard this all before and it is a reality. Don't come crying to me when your kid is 18, when you haven't done anything for the last 18 years. I'm not a miracle worker. I can't save your child by the snap of my fingers. You didn't take care of him for 18 years. And now you come crying

Closing Dua

May Allah cause us to live as Muslims, may He cause us to die as Muslims, and may He cause us to be resurrected as Muslims.

May Allah reward you well.

Peace be upon you.