Ask our children:
1. If someone is bad to us, what should we do?
2. What is the meaning of revenge? Is it better to take revenge or to forgive?
Now tell them the story:
Once, there was a little girl whose name was Faheemah. Faheemah never troubled anyone, but lots of other children troubled her, especially when she went to madrasah.
Sometimes Raheemah would hide her kitaabs, then she would get into trouble because Aapa thought that she lost the kitaabs. Sometimes, Naseemah would put water into her shoes, so when it was time to go home and she tried to wear her shoes, her socks would become wet! Finally, there was another naughty girl named Sameenah who liked to put her dirty, snotty tissues into Faheemah’s bag!
When the other children would trouble Faheemah, she would become very angry and upset. She could not understand why they were troubling her, because she never troubled anyone! Every day, as the children troubled Faheemah, she became more and more angry. However, she did not tell anyone what was happening.
She never told her parents, her Aapa or anyone else. Instead, she wanted to get revenge. Just as the other children were troubling her, she wanted to trouble them back and make them angry as well. So Faheemah sat and thought, planning her revenge…
The next day, Faheemah went to madrasah early, before everyone else. After entering the madrasah, she went to Raheemah’s desk and hid a roll of stickers underneath it. Then, she stuck a big sticker on Aapa’s desk. Thereafter, after Aapa and all the other students came, while everyone was busy learning their work, Aapa suddenly noticed the sticker on her desk.
Aapa became angry and asked, “Who stuck a sticker on my desk?” All the students said that they were innocent – they did not stick the sticker. But, since someone had stuck it, Aapa decided to search the desks to find the naughty student who had a roll of stickers. Aapa started with one desk, and then went to the next, and also searched Faheemah’s desk, but she did not find any stickers. Finally, when she looked under Raheemah’s desk, she found the roll of stickers.
Raheemah told Aapa that it wasn’t her packet, and she didn’t know where it came from, but Aapa did not believe her. Aapa scolded her and made her stay after class as punishment. When Faheemah saw Raheemah being scolded and punished, she felt happy, because Raheemah had done the same thing to her.
After getting Raheemah into trouble, Faheemah wanted to get revenge against Naseemah and Sameenah as well. She thought and thought, and had many different ideas. But then, before she could do anything, she heard a bayaan that made her change her mind.
A Moulana was giving a bayaan in the masjid, and Faheemah was listening to the bayaan at home with her mother. The Moulana was talking about how Nabi Muhammad (sallallahu ‘alaihi wasallam) went to Taa-if to invite the people of Taa-if to Islam. However, instead of treating him nicely and listening to him, they threw stones at him, hurt him until he was bleeding, and chased him out of the town.
The angels came to Rasulullah (sallallahu ‘alaihi wasllam) and offered to take revenge for him, by crushing these people between the mountains. However, Rasulullah (sallallahu ‘alaihi wasallam) forgave them. Even though they hurt him so badly, and made him bleed, and chased him, he did not want to take revenge.
The Moulana then explained that if a person forgives those who hurt him, then Allah Ta‘ala will give him a very great reward. The happiness he will feel when he gets this reward will be far more than the happiness he feels when getting revenge. So, instead of hating people in our hearts and trying to get revenge, we should rather forgive and forget. In fact, Nabi (sallallahu ‘alaihi wasallam) was so kind, that the more people were bad to him, the more he was good to them!
When Faheemah thought about it, she realized that Moulana was right. Instead of getting revenge, she should have forgiven Raheemah. Now that she had heard the bayaan, she decided that she would not get revenge against Sameenah and Naseemah. Instead, she was going to be extra nice to them!
The next day, before going to madrasah, Faheemah asked her mother, “Mummy! Can you please give me three chocolates?” Faheemah’s mother was shocked and said, “Three chocolates! You can’t eat three whole chocolates yourself Faheemah! Your tummy will explode!” Faheemah laughed and said, “No mummy, it’s not for me! I want to give the chocolates to three girls in madrasah.” Faheemah’s mother was happy that Faheemah wanted to share with others, so she happily packed three chocolates into a packet and gave it to her.
After madrasah that day, as all the children were waiting for their fathers to fetch them, Faheemah gave the chocolates to Naseemah, Sameenah and Raheemah. When they got the chocolates, their eyes became as big as saucers and they said, “Wow! Jazakallah Faheemah!” Then, as they enjoyed the chocolates, they began to feel bad. They realized that even though they had been bad to Faheemah, she was still kind and nice to them. So, they said to Faheemah, “Faheemah! We are sorry that we troubled you! Will you please forgive us and be our friend?”
Faheemah was surprised, but also delighted and overjoyed! She now understood that if you hate people and take revenge, then you will only get more enemies. But, if you forgive people and are kind to them, then Allah Ta‘ala will be happy with you and people will also like you and will be your friend.
Lessons:
1. If someone is bad to us, then we can tell our parents or our Aapa so that they can help us. After that, we must try to forgive the person and be good to them, as this will make Allah Ta‘ala happy.
2. Revenge means that when a person is bad to you, then you also want to be bad to him. Instead of taking revenge, you should forgive him and even be kind to him. If we do this, Allah Ta‘ala will be happy with us, and people will also like us and be happy with us.
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