Strengthen The People’s Bond Even If It Is With Greetings

Dr Adekunle Mikail

The time we are living now is awful, boding, portentous, pressing, horrible and finally, terrible! Though we need to tend our unreserved apology to Allah, our Lord and Creator, for using such equally awful adjectives to describe the time for the Noble prophet ( salla-llahu alehi wasalam) has warned us in one of his ahadith to ”desist from shaming the Time for God is the Time and He directs the Night and the Days while the possession of all suzerainty lies with Him!”, but despite this, the time we are living now is somehow!

From dire economic situation of the nation, kidnapping of innocent citizens, unemployment of the mass higher citadels’ of knowledge graduates , health issues such as the transnational COVID-19 and its new variant , the omicron form, to depression and finally to its deadly repercussion , suicide!

Not that the people of the past had been free from the afflictions of the time in their respective eras; nay , they had been visited with much more deadly distresses than what we are experiencing now but the structures of their societies, their philosophies and psychologies of lives had a profound positive impacts in their coping and surviving mechanisms.

Then , humanity, good neighbourhood, and the love of others were the ethos guiding living together with one another. Isolationism living, whereby , contacts with families and friends were deactivated, was not the order of the day. People saw themselves as their brothers’ keepers and the security of the society was the job and responsibility of everybody in the society.

Within the family and societal settings, the children in the surrounding were not the property of their respective families alone but were handled as a collective gift bestowed to that society by the almighty God. This was the reason there was a franchise to tutor and sanction a wayward child by the members of the society when he derailed from the line of moral rectitude without his parents bordering to react in negative manner so as to register their grievances towards the members of the society sanctioning of their child!

Furthermore, when there was unnecessary display of wealth on the part of a member of the society who was not known for inheriting wealth from those that sired him nor having a job commensurating with the wealth ostensibly displayed , the members of the society to which such a person belonged then would make sure he was investigated so that the society would not be adversely affected by the examples he might later set if he was not quickly quarantined and guilded !

Even, the methods adopted by the world religions were also communal! There were good rapports between the hoi polloi and the well-to-do as there were readiness and programs to salvage the negative happenings that could befall individuals in the community. Besides, then friends were friends in all intent and purpose. They stood by their companions when time happened with them in all its ramifications.

Now, despite the advancement in science and technology in every field of human endeavors, there is backwardness in the arts of interpersonal relationship and communal living. To say the plain truth, what is obtainable in urbanity today is a pure rurality and vice versa _ for thousands of people living in urban centers of the world today, there is the lack of urbanity in their living, it is only in the markets and schools they actually mingle with one another and both centers are becoming deserted too these days due to health challenges and advancement in the technology. Health issues are making schools becoming virtual while technology is rendering markets more individualistic and physical!

It is only in the townships of the world that remains a semblance of real living for the dwellers still know one another, hold physical meetings, visit their relatives, go extra length to salvage their companions bad days and experiences, clear the poor debts, share thoughts and greetings after their daily or weekly worships in their respective worship centers !

In the urban areas of the world,life is in a flux_ parents and the aged people are abandoned without care by their children in drove forgetting the pangs of birthing and bringing them up. Like birds, whenever the children begin attending high schools ,their parents become old apparels to be cast aside in a dustbin in their faces. If the areas enjoy some government supports in favour of the aged, nurses are engaged to cater for the elderly. But can nurses render to the aged the natural love imbued in the hearts of the children towards their parents? Can other people’s children act like one’s children in the old age?

What is more pathetic is the condition of the claimants in being God’s worshipping people who are daily joining the bandwagon, after God Has described them in Qur’an 9:71 as follows :

” And the believing men and believing women are protecting friends of one another”

The believing men and women are protecting friends of one another when they visit the sick among them and cater for them in terms of spiritual and material needs of that time and condition. When not, they are not better than a conglomerate of ordinary worshippers chanting the praise or names of God in vain!

The believing men and women are protecting friends of one another when they remove from the people’s ways daggers ; both terrestrial and celestial. When not, they are the same in the estimation of the people and God, with the stones and trees’ worshippers.

The believing men and women are protecting friends of one another when they strive to elevate the moral of one another by encouraging one another in the worships of Allah, in seeking knowledge and in its application of the knowledge sought!

The believing men and women are protecting friends of one another when they put into practice the six responsibilities of a Muslim to other Muslims as stated in the Hadith as follows :

” The responsibilities of a Muslim are six: when he meets his brother he greets him; when he is invited to a dinner by his brother he honoured him by his presence;when he seeks his advice ; offer him good one ; when he sneezes and praises Allah, pray for him ( Yar-hamka-llahu); when he sicks , visits him and when he dies follows his Bier and attend his Janazah”

In addition, the believing men and women are protecting friends of one another when they relieve one another of the pain which befalls them and share the grief and sorrow that comes their ways. Likewise, they must participate actively in their joyous occasions .The purpose of their sharing their grief should be to alleviate their suffering and the aim of their participation in their festivities ought to be to enhance their joy.

More over, they will be protecting friends of one another when they strictly fraternize as they were described in the Hadith of the prophet salla-llahu alehi wasalam as follows :

” The Muslim fraternity is like a mansion . Even as each brick supports and cements the other brick, so does a Muslim act as a support and a source of strength for the other Muslims”

Imagine, when the believers behave as painted above, who will ever entertain the thought of commiting suicide or giving way to unnecessary depression as they are common these days! When humanity is engaged, when friends act true to type and when children take great care of their parents and guardians, who will have the evil notion of wanting to kill himself not to talk of killing others!

It said in an Hadith of the prophet salla-llahu alehi wasalam that :
” he who kills himself by an object in this life will be punished by whatever he had killed himself with in this life, in the hereafter!”. From the Hadith above mentioned, Allah will not say because someone was suffering in life and because of that he had ended his own life and when he is now with Allah, he will be blessed the more for killing himself, rather, he will be queried as to the reason for not having patience and for not having the belief that Allah’s blessing and mercy were nearer to him more than his jugular vein!

An idea
The prophet salla-llahu alehi wasalam, in one of his enigmatic elements avers :” strengthen your families’ bonds even with just a greeting”. I.e, bond with your family members even if with already greeting by calling them, visiting them and asking after their affairs!

In another instance he ( salla-llahu alehi wasalam) he said :

” You can’t enter the paradise unless you believe in God and you can’t believe until you love one another! Should I point you to deeds when you act upon them you will love one another and he commanded ” spread the greeting and offer food !”