He talked with gusto! He feared no one and mind no foe! He seemed to be out of this world; answered his questioner without bating an eyelids. His mind looked as if he had signed to face any repercussion which might arise as a result of what he had in mind to pursue.
We wouldn’t know what had called for the questions of the questioner to him in the first place! His response was a wonder, amazement, awe and a marvel. And when his friend was giving him face to stop answering his prober , he defied the body language of his buddy as his answer had defied sound reasoning and sane argument!
” Can you kill your father for monetary benefits?” The questioner had poised his question to him and his answered was as straight as an arrow; ” yes for sure!” . ”Your father , the very one who had sired you?” Yes, for sure, I give no qualm; he had given no qualm in abandoning me to the street!” He had bellowed thereafter.
” And your mother too, can you murder her for the same reason as above? Yes, if it is for money I don’t care who the victim can be!” . And the one who had been questioning him so far said :” then if you can go for your mother you can go for me too for all the love I have for you?” . ”Yes Baba was his reply ” and the video ended.
The conversations above are not fictional or scenes in a play which are mounted to demonstrate the rots in our society but actual life video in which somebody who regularly feeds and extends his good hands to the young miscreants in his place of abode was querying a young miscreant to sample his opinion as a way of unravel what can predispose young minds to killing others as it is predominant in our community now!
The young man might be under the influence of hard drugs but it was obvious he had not enjoyed responsible parental care and guide when he was growing and this had blocked his mind to the benefits ingrained in the prophet’s admonition to children that : ” paradise lies in the feet of mothers” , and ” Be charitable and honour your parents, your children will be charitable and honour you”
Parents, especially in this our Islam must start preparing for the kind of children they desired to sire before they ever have chance to marry, for marriage is not just a union of two opposite sexes only but a responsibility and responsibility and responsibility. It transcends having sexual intercourse with the female species on the part of men and goes beyond having children to dote on ,on the part of the women ! Instead it is a mixture of God’s help, maturity, rectitude, compassion, warmheartedness and uprightness in equal dose.
Rearing of children is more than rearing domesticated animals such as dog, goat and hen! It must be therefore handled with an equal dose of compassion and a bit of rigidity! The parents must show compassion to the children where it is necessary and be rigid, firmed and disciplined where it is necessary. It required the grace of God to navigate the murky water of parenting which is tinted with every good and evil imaginable.
This is the reason in Islam why parenthood commences from the pre-marriage time! A would-be parents will have to choose wisely who shall be their partners making sure their focuses are godliness and good character in their spouses but not only beauty, wealth and good family as espoused in the hadith of the prophet salla-llahu alehi wasalam as follows :
” Men do marry lady for four reasons ; for her wealth, her beauty, her family pedigree and her religion! But be victorious (in marriage) with the essential of religion ( godliness, maturity, patience , fear of God and God’s grace) and your hands will be beneficially fixed!”
Besides, when couples started having children, it is required of them as parts of their responsibilities to them to give the children good names; for it lies in beautiful names beauty of characters, purposefulness and grace of God as it is embedded in bad names bad inheritances such as melancholy, misfortune and its like ;to give them excellent character by teaching them excellent behaviour and by behaving well in their presence for it is a way to success in this life and in the hereafter; and by teaching them the Book of Allah which is the glorious Qur’an for it contains the guide to God’s way, the security from the vicissitudes of life and manners to healthy life.
If anything is missed out of the above, the children may not be properly baked to face the challenges of life. They may go ahead and become in the first place ,haters of the hands that weaned them, and later constitute nuisance to their immediate and remote society like the boy aforementioned who was ready to kill his mother and father for money!
As observed by one of the savants of Islamic knowledge and learning, Ibn Qayyim Al-jaosy ; ” it is rare to see a bad moniker except that it has a bad effect on its bearer ”! This is the reason naming a child on the seventh day of his birth in Islam is not a merrymaking activity but a sacred and solemn exercise aiming at preparing the child for future; safeguarding his life and seeking Allah’s benefits on his endeavors in life.
In another instance, the prophet had named the animal slaughtered on the seventh day of a child birth as a ” mortgage , ( a special secured loan ) which is slaughtered for him alone. It is to be distributed to the well-wishers without taking anything in lieu of it from the well-wishers again by the parents.
Still , some of the Faithfuls when slaughtered it, diverted it to another purpose entirely from its religious value. They used its meat to entertain their guests who will give them gifts in forms of money and material things in returns ! It is derailed from being a form of alms and charity to the poor in the society to entertaining object to all and sundry in the neighborhood.
Among the requirements of Islam on the parents after naming the children excellent names such as Abdullah , Abdul-Rahman, or any other names which are parts of Allah’s names and attributes after ”Abdul” is prefixed with them or the names of the angels or that of the prophets are:
In Islam, taking from Qur’an 2 vs 233, mothers should suckle their children for two years for those that want to complete the time of suckling! This has be proven to be of utmost beneficial for both physiological and psychological growths of the children! Now the U.N is mounting a rigorous campaign on the benefits of suckling children for two years, a gift which had been given to the Islamic world for more than 1,400 years!
Fathers too must strive to provide moderate shelter, good food and clothing for the mothers when suckling their children. It behoves father too, to know that taking good care of their families is their sole responsibility which should not be shared with the mothers unless they do it out of their own volition! This is contained in the verse above as follows;
” …and their maintenance and clothing must be borne by the father with goodness”
Abandoning the mothers and children responsibilities is amounted to a big sin in the face of God and doing so has been traced to the callousness of some children in future! Like the boy mentioned earlier, who could do anything for money including killing his own parents for money, he might had turned out like that , for the simple reason that he had not been cared for while growing up while he had been equally damaged psychologically and this had pushed him to care not for anybody when grown up ! The prophet salla-llahu alehi wasalam had said :
” It is enough sin for a man to care less for those under him”
Avoiding imprecating or cursing the children by all means possible is another requirement of Islam on the parents to children. Imprecating a child is a way of helping Satan on him and a means of exposing him to Satan’s guile against him while it quickly predisposes him to errors and bad behaviour. The prophet salla-llahu alehi wasalam had said:
” Do not curse your own selves, nor curse your children or your property for you may not know the time of answering a prayer, that your curse may have been answered”.
Likewise a man complained to Ibn Mubaraq ( may he be blessed the more) about his child and Ibn Mubaraq asked the man :” have you been cursing him” ? When the man said ” yes”, he said :” you have destroyed him with your imprecation!”
Provision of good education and urging the children to strive in acquiring it, is another requirement of Islam on the parents. The parents should know that no matter how gigantic their inheritance may be, it can be easily frittered away by unschooled and unrighteous children after their demise ! This is why Islam has made the provision of good education for the children in conjunction with good character a lofty priority and its most important focus.
Under the provision of good education lies the inculcation of Islamic creed in the souls of its children. This should be done even before the children are of age! It must be the lullaby song that must be singing to them when they are still at the laps of their mothers. Samratu Bn Jundab had said:
” We were children at the time of the apostleship of the messenger of Allah and he ( the prophet salla-llahu alehi wasalam) used to teach us Islamic creed before he taught us the Qur’an, afterwards he taught us the Qur’an and we increased in Islamic creed!”
And when they are coming of age, the characters they will befriend should be scrutinized and monitored properly. Children from the neighborhood who are showing tendencies for petty thievery, neighborhood brawl, busy bodying and bogus life styles must be barred from having rapport with ones’ children.
It is not an exaggeration in the saying of the prophet salla-llahu alehi wasalam that ” friends walk in the shadow of his friend’s religion, so let everyone of you scrutinize whom he befriended”; as bad company and friend had pushed a child with good character into untoward behaviours which had jeopardized his life forever.
Children as well, need to be brought up with kindness and compassion. These are the two characters which beautify other ones and put the love of others in their psyche as they will erase selfishness from their inner minds. As for those children that are not brought up in the house of compassion, they have grown to be stonehearted, calloused and insensitive to others around them like the boy aforementioned who would do anything to eke out living including murdering his parents!
The prophet of Islam is no doubt a prophet of mercy and compassion. He has applied mercy and kindness to every situation and people around him and he had been given the alias ” God-mercy- to – all”. ‘Aqrau Ibn Yabbis had seen him playing with his two grandsons; Hassan and Hussein with intensity and had quipped:” I am blessed with ten children yet I had never kissed or played with any one of them!” The prophet salla-llahu alehi wasalam, had told him as a warning afterwards :” he would not be showing mercy to, who had not been merciful to others!”
A Courage; The Story Of Mu’awiyyah And The Scholar ”Ahnafu”
Caliph Mu’awiyyah was angrier with his child, Yazid and he abandoned him. When Ahnafu visited him he admonished Mu’awiyyah as follows:
” O you the leader of the Faithfuls: our children are fruits of our souls and the pillars of our backbones! We are the heavens who shade them ( in the sun and rain); when they are angry, make them pleased and when they asked you something; endeavour to gift then and when they have not asked you ,still give them what they need. Do not look down upon them scornfully so that your life will be meaningless to them and so that they will not pray for your life to end quickly!”
On hearing this, Mu’awiyyah sent a boy to call Yazid for him and to extend salamah to him and told the maid :” give him 200, 000 dirham” . When Yazid was told of his father invitation and gift ,he asked the maid : ” who was with the Amir ( his father)? The maid replied :” Aanafu!” And he said : ”Call him for me!”
When Aanafu arrived, Yazid said :” O you the father of the sea ( i.e too much knowledge) ” how did the story go?” Aanafu then recounted the story to him and he quipped :” share the gift with the father of the sea and let go and meet the Amir.
Abu Tammim Habeeb Bn Awsi At-Ta’iy had sung:
” Indeed, our children in our midsts are our liver walking on the surface of the earths!”