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In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the kind and the kind of messengers and messengers. Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him and his family. Peace and blessings be upon him and his family. After that, my brothers and sisters, we talked about the overall background, the reason why parenting, conscious and thoughtful parenting is absolutely critical. Parenting is not something that will happen by default. It’s not something that will happen because you want it. It is something you have to work on. And it starts with having a dream for your child, which is a shared dream. So, it has to be a three-way conversation. The father, the mother and the child together. Have the conversation with regard to what you want this child to become and why. And the child must be… the prime mover behind that. The child should want it. And you as a parent must support that. And if you feel that the child wants something which is inappropriate or which you think is not the right thing, then it is your job, with love and with understanding to guide the child to where you think the child should be. And again, be very careful and clear in this. It is not always that you have the right answers. You may not have the right answers. But you can try to find ways to help them. And so, having that level of humility to know that the child also has an understanding… And at the end of the day, the child… If you really want the child to exceed… and excel… then that will happen only if the child… is herself or himself completely committed to that goal. And that commitment cannot be forced. So, that’s a very important thing to understand. Commitment cannot be forced. Commitment has to come from inside.
If you want the commitment to come, then you have to spend the time and the energy behind it. Now, let me talk about what I call the six rules of Islamic parenting, because we are talking about parenting from an Islamic context. And as I mentioned before, these are important because this is something that we will be questioned about by Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala when we meet Allah. As I said before, to be a parent, to have a child is not a blessing. Allah never used the word niyamah for children. Allah used the word fitrah, which means test. So a child is a test. And if you pass the test, then it becomes a niyamah. But by itself, it’s not a niyamah. If the child, if you fail in that test, then may Allah have mercy on us, the children can become the opposite of niyamah. So they can be a sadaqah jariyat, they can be a niyamah for you, or they can be the opposite of that. And that is, that depends on what we choose to do. Illa mashallah. So these are the six, what I call my rules. The first and foremost is to introduce Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala to the child. The child must know who Allah is. And the child must have a relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala. It’s not just a matter of intellectually knowing somewhere, this is Allah, this is a description, no. So what? Why is that important? How does that relate to me as a human being, as a Muslim? So knowing Allah, introducing Allah is these two things. One is, who is Allah, His glory, His majesty, His power, His authority, His generosity, what He has blessed us with and so on, and answering it when we go back to Him, inshaAllah. And what is my relationship with that? Because, only when I understand my relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala, then it comes to the actual action which is, therefore, what should I do? Therefore, what do I need to do? Right? It’s not a, as I said before, it’s not an intellectual exercise. This is a very personal relationship, which is closer and more personal than any other relationship, or the face of the earth, including our relationship with our own parents. Because all relationships of this world end with our death. The only relationship which remains is our relationship with our Creator, with our Khalif-e-Malik, with Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala. This remains with us even after we die.
Second one is to introduce Rasulullah, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, to your child. And then you can come back to this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this things form even anywhere in our education. They’re not there at all. I won’t ask you to raise hands because I don’t want to shame anybody. But if I ask you this question and say, how many of you have read at least one book on the seerah of Rasulullah ﷺ? How many of you can say yes? At least one book, right? I don’t know if you did. And if you did not, when will you start? When? Today. Today, right? Today, not even tomorrow. Today, tonight. If you download on Kindle, you get it instantly.
Today. Don’t even let a night pass. Rasulullah ﷺ is the reason why we are Muslims. Let’s understand this very clearly. We say Allah gave us Iman. Allah did not come to you and give you Iman. Allah gave His Deen to His Rasul ﷺ.
Tabaraka allazhi nazala al-furqana ala abdihi. Allah did not say nazala al-furqana ala ummatihi or nazala al-furqana ala al-muslimin or al-mumin. No. Ala abdihi. The Kalam of Allah came to only one. And that one is Muhammad ﷺ. And thanks to Muhammad ﷺ. We got the Kalam of Allah. When we say the Kalam of Allah came to the Muslims, yes, I agree with you. As in, we are responsible for it. We are the honour bearers of it. But the Kalam did not come to you. Kalam came to the Rasul ﷺ. That is the reason why we must be connected to the Rasul ﷺ as his people of his ummah. As people who follow him. Please understand. Please understand. Just loving the Rasul ﷺ is not enough. Because nobody loved Rasul ﷺ more than Abu Talib.
I won’t even talk about Abdul Muttalib and so on because he died before Rasul ﷺ became. He got his prophethood. But Abu Talib, he did not just love Rasul ﷺ. The man literally sacrificed his own wealth and his position. He gave his authority and everything on Rasul ﷺ. Wallah, Hiswara, Allah. The kind of sacrifice, the kind of support that Abu Talib gave to Muhammad ﷺ. Wallah, I don’t know who gave other than him. Right? Sahaba, of course, they were there. People like Abu Siddiq and so on, they gave more. But I’m not talking about them. I’m saying, take the second generation onwards. But what is the…
What is the ending of Abu Talib? Without Islam. Without Islam. So just loving Rasul ﷺ is not sufficient. That love has to be converted to obedience. Love has to be converted to obedience. As we say, Urdu, Rasul کو maarna nahi hai. Rasul ki maarna hai. Rasul ki maarna hai. Rasul ki maarna hai. You don’t just accept him as a Rasul. No, you accept him and obey him. This relationship must be inculcated in our children. Number three is systematic Islamic education. I’ll go into details with all this, what it is. Systematic Islamic education, not YouTube videos.
Not TikTok videos. Not Shorts.
Systematic Islamic education. Which includes learning the Arabic language. You’re living in Kuwait. What more can you get?
To learn Arabic. There are people who are living in other countries who dream of living in an Arab country where I can learn Arabic literally. Walking, talking, my daily job, you know. All of you must become fluent in Arabic. Completely native speaker level, fluent in Arabic. Also, interestingly, this is something which is brilliant for your careers. Your career, whatever work you’re doing will become, you will see how that will accelerate if you can speak Arabic fluently. You don’t need convincing when you go and live in America or somewhere and say, you must learn English. Nobody, you don’t need to be convinced. You know that. So how come you live here and you don’t speak Arabic? Why? So starting with that, systematic Islamic education. Number four, life skills. How to get it wrong in the world?
What must you do? What must you not do? What works? What doesn’t work? Life skills. Number five, communication and conflict resolution. Very, very, very important.
And these are things which screen addiction kills. Being addicted to phones and screens destroys all this. And the last and by last I wrote me the least, last and very important is akhlaq. Akhlaq and maamilat. Manners and dealing.
This is one of our big, big, big problems. And for most of you, you’re like this. You’re like this for most of you. You’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you. And for most of you, you’re like this for most of you.
end to the other. Completely, maybe six, eight feet wide, huge, big thing, carpet of shoes. And I am asking myself, how can I respect my brothers who are inside the masjid by not stamping on their shoes as I go in? I don’t want to stamp on your shoes. It’s disrespectful. It destroys your shoe that I should stamp on your shoe. I don’t want to do that. Please give me a way. How can I do that? Why does this happen? Tell me. Why? And there are beautiful shoe racks which are made, they are there, they are empty. All the shoes are here. You are forcing other people to stamp on your shoes. God knows where they walk. They come with those dirty soles. They are stamping on your shoes and walking in the masjid. Because you make them do that. Why? And my point is, if I have no respect for my own property, how can anybody else have respect for me? I am beginning with this because this is so simple but it is so important. And it is almost like a standard for masajid. How do we know this is a masjid? Look outside, see where the shoes are. If the shoes are scattered all over, it has to be a masjid. It cannot be a temple because the shoes will be in one place. It cannot be a Buddhist stupa because the, or a pagoda because the shoes will be in one place. It cannot be a church because they walk in with the shoes so there is no shoe problem there. How do I know if it is a masjid? If the shoes are scattered all over. This is an alamat. This is a sign that there are Momineen inside. Innalillahi wa innalillahi wa. How shameful, how bad is this? Why? And we do the same thing with parking. You know I live in America. Every place, anywhere you want to build a masjid, you will have a problem with the local community. Almost 100%. Local people, no. Masjids cannot be built. They will file cases, they will do this, they will go to the town council, they will say don’t give permission this that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. You cannot do that. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. all these people anti-Muslim.
They are all enemies of Islam, enemies of Allah and Rasool. No. You know why they object? Because of parking.
Car parking. That’s it. No other objection.
I have spoken. I do a lot of interfaith work. I work with priests and I work with Jewish rabbis. I have been invited to speak to actually preach a sermon in the biggest cathedral in Springfield, Massachusetts in the month of in their equivalent of their Ramadan which is in Lent.
I recited the Quran from the pulpit.
They are not anti-Muslim. You go and ask them, do you have anything against Islam? No.
You have something against Mohammed Sasa? No. Then why are you objecting? Because of your parking. If Muslims have a mosque, this place will be trashed. They will park on people’s lawns. They will park across the driveway of somebody who can’t get out to go anywhere.
You are driving a $100,000 car and you don’t know how to park it.
Why?
And they say, you ask them, what about churches? We don’t have no problem. We don’t have any problem. We don’t have any problem. We don’t have any problem. We don’t have any problem. We don’t have any problem. Christian people go to church, they don’t park their cars. They will park it in the parking lot or they will park it along the road or they will go to a paid parking and they will put the coins in it and they will park it. They will not park the car on your lawn. Muslims do.
So, protest.
Please, we have to change ourselves. Really, seriously.
And the reason I am saying this with parenting is because this is how we raise our children. If your child sees you parking like that, that child is going to grow up into a young man or woman who will also park like this.
And then our dealings. Mawilat.
I can tell you story after story. I don’t think I need to tell you of how difficult it is and how difficult it is and what happens when you do a dealing with a Muslim.
So, please, let us be very clear. This is what we need to tell.
Sufian of Saudi Ramadhanalai, he says, the link between knowledge and action, he says, knowledge knocks on the door of action but if the door is not open, it leaves.
Knowledge knocks on the door of action but if the door is not open, it leaves.
InshaAllah. We will end here for now.