How to Keep Peace in the Family?
The questions to which I want to draw your attention have recently been increasingly raised in society. All of them are connected with disagreements between spouses that caused their divorce, or are related to the complaints of parents that they cannot reconcile themselves with their children. I think that such questions are also addressed to imams. In this article, I intend to guide spouses to the correct relationship, and to give them good advice to protect them from disagreement.
The first reason for quarrels between husband and wife is that the husband tells his wife, frightening her, that a certain woman, «is very beautiful, she dresses well, but you do not know how to dress like that», or «You’re fat, and she’s slim, and if you do not become like her, I will take a second wife.” Men easily pronounce such words. Now I have a question - before marriage, was she too fat and unattractive? I want to ask such a man: «Has she become unattractive, now that you have a choice? Perhaps you have now become rich? How could she become ugly after being beautiful! When your parents wooed her, you almost begged that she would marry you - they saw her just as she was, that is, beautiful. «So I have to blame men for this.
The husband blames his wife for not caring for herself, does not dress beautifully and so on. There are no women who do not like to take care of themselves and wear good clothes. But this requires material security. Because of her love for him and thinking that her husband is content with her, the woman is content with his modest position and does not tell him that he is not able to provide for them - so that he is not ashamed or angry or because she fears that he may hate her or because she wants to preserve their family. Not even being able even to buy diapers for the baby, she tolerates this situation, hoping for a better time. What is more, the husband - as it were – takes a stick to the head of the poor thing, who already has a headache from all these problems, saying that he wants to take a second wife. When a wife shows such ethical considerations for her husband and does not want to upset him and does not tell him about material problems, shouldn’t he be more ethically considerate towards her and respect her rights and those of her children? After all, one day her good attitude may change into a bad disposition. How long will she tolerate this?
Do not turn her away from the religion of Allah and the Prophet e
Krilov has a fable that tells how a wolf, when he wanted to eat a lamb, claimed that he was muddying his water, although the lamb was downstream. Similarly, when a man wants to take a second wife and cannot say it directly, he looks for excuses and says: «If you are not obedient, then I will take a second wife,» or, «If you do not dress well, then I’ll take a second». Thus, the husband puts the blame on his wife and wants to get out of this situation like an innocent lamb. That’s why I have an issue with such men. Everything needs to be done in a way balanced on the scales of reason and the Shariah. Allah has explained to us in the Shariah what the punishment is for a wife’s disobedience. It is not written there that one can take a second wife, if the first is not submissive. Polygamous marriage is not permitted as punishment for a wife - it is the individual decision of every man. Think first: where did you get this notion from? What is the connection between the disobedience of your wife and your marriage to a second? A man who threatens with such words turns his wife away from Islam - which allows polygamy. The man also turns her away from Allah, Who has sent down Islam to us, allowing polygamous marriage. She will say: «Why did Allah allow them this, but not us?» And he also turns her away from the Prophet e, who came to us with Islam which allows polygamy.
I have another question: who turns out to be bad - a disobedient wife or a husband who cannot placate his wife with a wise word and who turns her away from Islam by such statements? This is a very serious issue. After all, the reason for her repulsion from Islam is her husband. If you are the head of the family and the wife does not obey you, refer to books, the Shariah, ask scholars, imams: if a wife does not obey her husband, what should he do? I heard that some people open businesses for a day and then close them and open others, leaving the first with its problems. The one who threatens his wife to take a second is like one who opens and closes one-day businesses. Imagine your daughter or sister in this position, because your wife is also someone’s daughter or sister. And from this the question arises: where, indeed, is your good nature? The Prophet e said: «Verily, I am sent to perfect good natures,» but where is the good disposition of such a person? You are, indeed, insulting people - because Allah who created them, also created you. Are not you afraid of His wrath?
Another thing I wanted to draw attention to is when women work while their husbands don’t : not as prescribed by the Almighty, but vice versa. Almighty Allah says in the Qur’an, «Men are the guardians of women» - that is, they are responsible for them. In the situation I am referring to, some men do nothing, while women go on commercial trips to Turkey and elsewhere. It’s another matter if, although the husband works, his family still does not have sufficient money, and so his wife gets a job to help him. But we have the opposite. A husband should seek a suitable job for himself. An imam said, «I had family problems for many years. When I bought a cow, I got rid of all the problems. The cow began to give milk and butter – generally enough for the family.» Ali al-Hawwas said: «Spend day and night seeking food for your family - even if people say that you are greedy and occupied with worldly things. This is better for you than if people say that you are a good person but you live on the charity of others waiting for them to give you something, and hate anyone who does not do this.» For example, if a rich person does not give you alms, you start slandering him and call him mean. Ali al-Hawwas says that it is better to be occupied with the worldly than to live in such a way.
Fusail (may Allah be pleased with him) said, «For me, it is preferable to engage in the mundane, playing on the drum and the pipe, than to acquire worldly goods through religion,» that is, to profit from what people give because of his piety. These are very valuable words. We all know that Fusail (may Allah be pleased with him) was a saint who was close to Allah. Therefore, the head of the family must earn, and it is better to look for food than lie on the couch, holding the TV remote control, while his wife brings earnings to the family. All the sheikhs of the tarikat reproach him for whom his wife provides. Such a person is called an Alfonso. The sheikhs say, «Everyone who seeks ease in this manner is a dishonorable and ignorant person.» They imply that the husband should be occupied in worldly earnings for his family. Sayfulla-Kadi says, «Every non-working person to whom people give alms is like a pregnant woman.» Therefore, because of the many utterances of such great sheikhs as Fusail, Sayfulla-Kadi and others, the alims hastened to earn their living. Some were engaged in trade, others in farming and other useful things, so as not to be gigolos and those whose wives work while they lie on the couch.
Almighty Allah, praising people who work, says, «They are (men) whom neither trade nor selling distracts from the remembrance of Allah.» After all, we do not tell a man that when he works, he must abandon the remembrance of Allah. On the contrary, let him remember Allah while working. This is indeed what the Prophet edid. He was engaged in trade before he married. Did Prophet Musa not pasture sheep for ten years before marriage? In our time we are ashamed to herd sheep, a wife is ashamed to milk the cow, we have become very proud people - maybe we are better than the Prophet e? Doesn’t this question indeed arise? Our Prophet ebefore his marriage made a trip to Sham on trade matters. Could he not have stayed at home, saying that he was a good man?
SHEIKH AKHMAD-AFANDI
