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(choir vocalizing)
(bell dings)
- Loving your parents, respecting them.
"birrul walidayn"
That's usually how I like to translate.
"birrul walidayn"
You know, being dutiful to your parents.
Forget all that.
I like to say it loving your parents, showing them the love
and the respect that they are due,
showing them the care and the comfort that they deserve,
being a person who is under their feet
in in acceptance of their direction and their teaching.
All of that is congruent and in spirit
of the deen of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
Did you know that whenever Allah orders us to worship nobody
other than him, that the very next statement,
"wa bil walidayni ihsana",
and treat your parents with good ethics and manners?
Did you know that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala invites
us to having "birr",
which is to be opposite
to what most other people do for their parents?
Most other people are not kind.
Most other people do not give time.
Most other people are not generous
with their wealth and their energy and their effort.
Most other people do not call their parents
each and every day.
Most other people are those who,
if you were to ask their parents,
and if they were to be honest, they would say,
"My heart is darkened towards them.
I'm not happy with them.
They haven't respected me as I deserve.
They haven't appreciated the sacrifices that I've made.
I've been a single mother trying to help my child,
and they haven't appreciated it.
I've been a father who works all day,
slaves all night to put Halal income on the table.
I drive a taxi, or I'm standing
in an operating theater as a doctor.
I'm doing the best I can for my children, but I come home
and ask for something as simple as, "Have you prayed?
Have you done the simple obligations of life?"
and the answer is disappointing.
Moses, Musa Alaihis Salam asked Allah once,
this is recorded by Imam Al-Dhahabi,
he asked, he said, "Oh, Allah, Man yujawiruni fil jannah?"
who will be my neighbor in paradise?"
And Allah said to him, "Innahu sallaakh"
"It will be a butcher."
Musa was surprised.
Well, you know, Haruun and Ibrahim,
and you know, a butcher, who's this butcher?
He is not even a prophet or a messenger of Allah.
"Oh, Allah, arrini iyya?
oh, Allah, let me meet this man, is he alive?"
And Allah says, "Yes, take this path.
Go down to this area, travel to this land,
and you will find a man who is preparing a- a- a-
a meat that he has just slaughtered.
That will be your neighbor in Jannah."
So Musa finds this man, and is observing him
from a distance, trying to find out the reason.
What does this man do that will make him
at the level of the one who speaks to Allah,
the one who combated Pharaoh?
What has he done to deserve such a high place in Jannah?
And after hours, he doesn't see anything significant.
And as the sun is beginning to set, the butcher has packed
up his shop, and he's taken a little bit of meat with him.
And Musa comes to him and he says,
he doesn't know Musa Alaihis Salam,
he says to him, "I'm traveling through this land.
Can I spend time in your home?
Would you be generous?"
And the man said, "Yes, but I'm going to be busy
for the first little while, so keep yourself occupied.
Don't take it as a sign of disrespect, and when I'm free,
I will tend to you and we will eat together."
And as Musa comes to this man's very modest small home
that's near a river, he sees that the man enters the home
and has lit a fire outside it, and gotten a pot of water
heated up, and goes into the home,
and from a top shelving area,
he brings down this large basket,
and in this basket folded up in nice,
you know, linen is this old, frail woman.
And the man carries the basket down to the river
and removes this old, frail woman from it, and bathes her
in the river, washes her clothes after, changes her clothes,
sits her near the fire, combs out her hair.
All the while, the meat that he had brought
with him from the market is being cooked.
And he's combed out her hair, dressed her,
washed her clothing, hung it up, and Musa is watching
from a distance intent on wow, what is happening here?
And finally, the man takes some of the meat,
and begins to chew it up, and begins to feed this woman.
And every time from a distance, Musa sees
that this woman is eating and enjoying the meal,
he sees that she's saying something,
but Musa is too far, alaihis salam, to hear it.
So afterwards, the man wraps her up,
bundles her up, recites some prayers with her,
kisses her and loves her, and entertains her,
and then darkness has fallen.
He puts her up in the shelving again, and she falls asleep.
And then he turns to Musa and he says,
"This is the remainder of the meat.
Let's enjoy our meal together.
What's your name, where have you come from?"
Musa says, "No, no, no, no.
Before all that, who are you, and who is this woman?"
He says, "Innaha ummi." "This is my mother."
And Musa Alaihis Salam says, "Your mother?"
He says, "Yes."
He said, "Kam min sanatin?"
how many years have you been serving her in this way?"
He says, "Li ashri sineen."
"It's been 10 years that I've been entertaining her
in this way, cleaning her, looking after her,
you know, bathing her, feeding her, nurturing her,
and I haven't gotten married yet,
because I wanted to be the one who serves her.
I didn't want, you know, anybody else who comes
and would distract me from her, so I've given
my full attention to her until Allah makes it easy."
And he said, "You know, I wanted to give her all this love."
So Musa said, "I saw that when you feed her,
you've chewed the meat."
And then he goes, "She doesn't have teeth anymore,
so I feed her."
He said, "Well, what does she say when you feed her?
I saw every time you feed her, she says something."
And the man said, "Every time I feed her,
she makes du'a for me."
And Musa says, "What's the du'a that she makes?"
He said, "My mom, every time I feed her, she says,
"Allahumma ja'alhuman nabeeyeen." "Oh, Allah, put him
in the rank and in the heights of the prophets of God.'"
So Musa Alaihis Salam wept, and he said,
"Fainnaha lizalik." "It is because
of this that you will be my neighbor in Jannah."
And Musa lets him know that he is the prophet of Allah Musa
and subhanallah
It's such a beautiful, beautiful statement
from the seerah of Musa Alaihis Salam.
I want you to consider the power and the beauty
of the du'a of your parents, the power and the beauty
of doing what other people don't do.
This is "birrul walidayn,"
doing what other people would not do,
caring in a way that other people would not care.
There's another story that uh- Imam al-Dhahabi in al-kabair
in the book titled "The Major Sins" describes a man
who was a sahabi
of the prophet SallAllahu 'Alaihi Wasallam that he was ill,
and the sahaba next to him sat with him and said,
"Qul lailaha illallah,"
"It's your final moment, you're about to die,
say 'laillaha illallah,'" but he was unable to say it.
And they came to the prophet.
SallAllahu 'Alaihi Wasallam Bilal comes and says,
"Oh, messenger of Allah.
He's unable to say it, we keep telling him,
but it's as if it's on the tip of his tongue,
but he's unable to say, 'lailaha illallah,'
we're fearful for him."
The prophet SallAllahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said,
"Bring me his mother if she's alive," and the mother comes
to the prophet SallAllahu 'Alaihi Wasallam,
and he says, "kayfa halu ubnuki?" "How is your son?"
She says, "Katheeru salah wa siyam."
"He prays a lot, he fasts a lot."
He says, "No, I don't ask you about how he is with Allah.
I ask you how he is with you," and she said,
"Inni sakhitha O messenger of Allah,"
"I was upset with him, oh messenger of Allah."
So the prophet says, "Ya Bilal, ijmaa alhathab."
Bilal gather lots of firewood and burn the house down
with him in it, for it's better for him to die in punishment
in this dunya than in the akhira."
And the mother, she heard this, she says,
"Oh no, messenger of Allah, wallahi,
I swear to you by Allah I have forgiven him
for what he has done and how he wronged me.
Oh messenger of Allah, I forgive him and I love him.
Oh, messenger of Allah,
I want for him a high place in Jannah."
And the prophet said to Bilal, go check on him,
and by the time Bilal came near his home,
they could hear him from outside the house saying,
"Lailaha illallah Muhammadur rasulAllah."
Your life, the light of your life is your connection
with your parents.
Honor them, love them, earn your reward through them.
Abdullah ibn Umar is narrated in Sahih Muslim,
he saw a man carrying his mother in hajj.
Imagine this man came from Medina on foot all the way
to Mecca, three weeks journey on foot carrying his mother,
performed all of the hajj and the tawaf and the sa'i
He did all these things, and he turns to Abdulah
and he says, "Can you believe I've carried her all this way?
Has this repaid her for some of the kindness she showed me?"
And Abdulah ibn Umar said, "wa la bi talqatin wahida"
"Wallahi, the pain of her delivering you
in your birth has not yet been equalized
by all of the service that you have done."
May Allah honor us with the honoring of our parents.
May Allah give us "birrul walidayn" and make us
from those who will receive it from our own children.
If you are young or old, nobody is more significant
in your connection to Allah than your father
and your mother, and your mother is more important
in this regard than your father,
even though it pains me as a father.
"Wasalillahumma wasallim wazid wabarik alaa sayidina
wa nabiyina Muhammad
SallAllahu 'Alaihi Wa ala ali wasahbih wasallim
Assalamulaikum warahmatullah
It's your brother Yahya Ibrahim
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