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(7) Mashari al-Ashwaq ila Masari al-Ushaaq

Ibn an-Nuhaas (رحمه الله)

3) “But my precious son!”

If you remember your precious son and you sympathise for him the sympathy of a compassionate father, for Allah the Most High has said: “Your wealth and your children are only a trial whereas Allah with him is a great reward” [55]

By Allah! He is more merciful to the child than his father, mother, brother and uncle and how not! when he had nurtured him before them with the breast of his mercy in the darkness of the interior organs. The child’s heart is in the hand of his gentleness and mercy in the womb of his mother and the loins of his father. So where was your compassion and sympathy for him when he was such? And after you where will be your closeness to him? How do you let hamper you from the abode of pleasure and neighbouring the noble Lord? A child who if small, you are with him concerned, or large for you are with him grieved, healthy for you fear for him, sick and your heart due to its weakness restless. If you manner him he angers and bolts or advise him, he sulks and bears grudge. With that which you expect from him of disobedience as of from many children.

If you give precedence to your cowardliness, if you pass by your miserliness, if you abstain from your preferences, then the trial will be greater. You hold it to be a blessing, but the tribulation will prevail and you see it as a favour. You wish for him contentment at the sake of your worry, his happiness for your sadness, his profit at your loss and increase in his dirham and dinar at decrease in your scale You burden for his sake that which you can not and you enter because of him into every tight situation. Cast him! Oh you! from your concern to he who created you and created him, trust his sustenance after you, upon the one who sustains you and sustains him. You have surrendered to Allah control of the affairs of the dominion and the realm and you do not surrender to him control of the affairs of your child after you die, and do you have even a slight control over such?

“...and to Allah belongs the domain and the earth and that is between them and to him is the return” [56]

By Allah! You do not posses the ability to benefit or harm him or yourself. Nor the ability of causing death, life or resurrection, you can not increase his life span by even slight nor his sustenance by the spot on a date. Death could ravage you suddenly then you would be reduced to powder in your grave, cast down and because of your deeds held prisoner, your dear child after you an orphan. Your wealth divided, you are inherited by an enemy or one of mercy, your family disperses in departure and residence and youimmense reward.” and it is said to you: Impossible! Impossible! Passed that which has passed. Regrets will be intensified and you will be alone with that which you have sent forth of good deeds and bad. Verily! Listen to the words of Allah the Mighty, the Forgiving warning you about that which you are in of deception:

“Oh mankind be afraid of your lord and fear a day when no father can avail ought for his son nor a son avail ought for his father, verily the promise of Allah is true , let not then this present life deceive you, nor let the chief deceiver deceive you about Allah” [57]

If your child is from amongst the blessed, then you shall be joined with him in paradise and if he is of the accursed, then he shall be so from now. The people of paradise do not join with the people of the fire, nor the pious with the wicked, it maybe that Allah grants you martyrdom and you intercede for him. Your absence from him would be an endeavour to save him, so seek that which will save you from the punishment and exert yourself in it for tomorrow:

“That day shall a man flee from his brother, and from his mother and his father, and from his wife and his children. Every man that day will have enough to make him careless of others.” [58]

Verily! This is an immense declaration: “...and Allah guides whom he wills to a straight path” [59]

Notes:

55 (At-Taghaabun:15)
56 (Al-Ma’idah:18)
57 (Luqmaan:33)
58 (Abasa:34-37)
59 (Al-Baqarah:213)

» posted by Seifeddine-M on 6th February 2012 - 0 comments

Surah an-Nisa, 4

"And give the women their dower in good cheer. Then, if they give up some of it out of their own sweet will, you may have it to your advantage and pleasure."[4] (4:4)

In the previous verse, the objective was to remove the injustice done to women through the multiplicity of marriages. This verse takes up a particular right of women and aims to remove the injustice practiced in this matter. This is the right of mahr (dower).

Commentary

In pre-Islam Arabia, injustices in the payment of dower took many forms:

1. To begin with, the dower which was the right of the girl being given in marriage, was not given to her. Instead, the dower was taken by the guardians of the girl directly from the husband - rank injustice indeed. To get rid of this practice, the Holy Qur'an said: (and give the women their dower). This command is addressed to the husbands so that they themselves give their wives their dowers and not give these to others. Also addressed here are the guardians of the girls with the instruction that they should, in case they happen to receive the dower meant for the girls, give it straight to the girls and make sure that they themselves do nothing to put the money in personal use without the permission of the girls.

2. Another injustice related to the attitude of the giver of the dower. If someone had to pay it and realised that there was no way out, he would be very sour and unhappy and do it unwillingly as if he was paying a penalty. This injustice was removed through the use of the word, : nihlah, since nihlah in Arabic usage means 'giving something cheerfully'.

So, the verse here teaches that the dower of women is their right which must be fulfilled as a matter of obligation. Since, as a rule, all obligatory rights must be discharged cheerfully, so it should be in the case of dower, that is, 'give in good cheer'.

3. Yet another injustice regarding the payment of dower was that many husbands, taking advantage of the powerlessness of the wife, would use pressure and make them forgo and forgive their dower. This act of theirs hardly brought forth real forgiving of the standing right, but they, on their part, went about free of the concern for dower which, according to their thinking, was 'forgiven'.

To eradicate this injustice, it was said in the verse: . It means: 'if these women give up some of it out of their own sweet will, you may have it to your advantage and pleasure.'

The point is that exacting forgiveness by pressure or compulsion from an unwilling wife is an exercise in futility. Nothing gets forgiven in this manner. But, should it be that they themselves elect, out of their free choice and will, in its most genuine sense, to forgo or forgive a part of the dower, or return it to you after they had already taken it, then, this is permissible for the husbands, and correct as well.

Surely, these injustices which the Holy Qur'an aims to remove in this verse prevailed at peak during Jahiliyyah. But, very regretably, some of these practices of pre-Islam days still survive among Muslims. There are tribes and geographical areas where one or the other such injustice is not difficult to find. All Muslims must stay away from being a party to such injustices.

The restriction of "out of their own sweet will" placed in this verse, has a secret of its own. The truth of the matter is that, according to the standard rule of Islamic Shari'ah, even the smallest portion of what belongs to someone is not lawful for someone else unless permitted gladly. The standard rule was set by the Holy Prophet Sallallahu 'Alayhi Wasallam: Peace be upon him when he said:

"Beware, do no injustice. Remember, a person's property is not lawful (for the other) unless it be through his sweet will." (Mishkat, p. 255)

This is a great principle from which many details issue forth.

Even in our own times, there are women who very much doubt that they are going to get their dower. They think asking for it is not going to please anybody, nor the refusal to forgive will make anyone any happier. So, like it or not, they just forget and forgo. This kind of forgiveness is not trustworthy. My respected teacher, Maulana Ashraf 'Ali Thanavi rahimahullah used to say that the real touchstone of forgiving gladly is to first hand over the amount of the dower in the hands of the wife, as its owner, who may later give it to the husband out of her own sweet will without any pressure.

This attitude of giving gladly should also be practiced as the operating principle in the inheritance of sisters and wives. It is not too uncommon that, following the death of the mother .or father, sons take over the whole property and do not give the girls their share. If the usurpers were bothered by moral or religious considerations in some degree, the most they would do is to go and excuse themselves before their sisters. Since they know that they are not going to get their share under this situation anyway, they simply go along and forgive against their will. In addition to this, the share belonging to the surviving wife is not given to her after the death of the father.

Particularly, a step mother just does not get hers. All this amounts to open usurping of rights. The only exception is that, should anyone forgive gladly, that forgiveness is possible, and valid.

Hadrat Thanavi rahimahullah also pointed out that the text is talking about the willingness of the whole human self and not simply the happiness of the heart which alone is not enough to make someone's property lawful for the other. People who give money in bribes, or interest, do so after a good deal of calculations, and many apparent gains, but this is not giving gladly, and not trustworthy either. If such people were to probe their conscience and come out with the truth, the truth would be that their self would flatly refuse to agree to such giving. This is why good cheer and sweet will have been given the deciding role.

If donations are sought for mosques, religious schools or for any other need, there too it is necessary to see that the giver is doing it freely and gladly. If a donation is given under pressure from anyone having tribal, social or legal authority or influence, without the free choice and will and pleasure of the giver, then, it is not lawful to accept and use this donation. Instead, it would be returned to the giver.

As for the word : saduqat appearing in the verse, it is the plural form of saduqah. The words, saduqah and sudaq signify the dower of women. In Mirqat Sharh Mishkat, Mulla 'Ali Qari writes: . It means that dower is referred to as saduqah or sudaq because its root, sadaqa signifies truth. Since dower too shows the true attitude of the husband towards his wife, the congruity was good enough to let dower be called sudaq or saduqah.

The words: hani'an and mari'an appearing at the end of the verse are attributive modifiers. The word, hani'an (from han'a and hanu'a and hani'a) means something received without having to go through labour and pain. When this refers to food, it means good food which is eaten and digested easily and becomes a healthy part of the human body.

The word, mari'an (from mara'a: to be wholesome) is also used in the same sense and is very close to each other. For this reason, some translators have made one word, in the sense of 'wholesome', stand for both. [Ma'ariful Qur'an]

» posted by Seifeddine-M on 6th February 2012 - 0 comments