“A Muslimah’s Guide to Living a Blissful Life” by Sayyidah Khairun Nisaa (rahimahallah) #10

Presently, the general situation has reached the point where parents are subservient to their children and are completely enamoured by them. This is the result of the parents failing to give their children the correct Deeni (upbringing and) education, where instead of making an effort to teach their children (Deeni values), they remain unconcerned and show scant regard to them.

When the mother and father neglect (to instil Deeni values in) their children, then they (eventually) become the subservient subjects of their children who will rule over them. When the parents will oblige their every request, give them complete freedom of choice, place the happiness of their children before their own happiness, not be prepared to ‘break the hearts’ of their children, and fail to teach them right from wrong, how will those children ever become subservient to their parents. As a result, their situation will definitely be that (lamentable mess) which we witness today.

Generally, the result of this (neglect to the upbringing of daughters) is that the daughters become extremely free and fearless. Hence, they do as they please and neither fear their parents nor Allah Ta‘ala. They possess no sense of shame, dignity and modesty, do not even know when these qualities are supposed to be displayed, and fail to realize the true value of these qualities.

They have forgotten the way of being well-mannered and showing love and have strayed from the path of modesty and bashfulness. In fact, they have no sense of the direction from which they came or the direction in which they are now heading. Furthermore, the concept of keeping good company is alien to them.

They are in love with entertainment and amusement and are obsessed with roaming about and reading novels and stories. At the same time, they show disinterest and disinclination in the Quraan and ahaadeeth. They are negligent of the obligations (of Deen) and are inclined towards sinful activities.

They possess the evil habits of lying and digging for the faults of people. They take those who are their actual friends as enemies, and befriend those who are their actual enemies. They become hot-tempered and easily influenced. Hence, they take a liking for any person’s ways that they find appealing and live their lives as they wish. They are neither bound to the sharee‘ah, nor do they possess respect and etiquette, nor do they have any sentiment or feeling of true loyalty towards Islam. They lack foresight and do not ponder over the outcome and consequence of actions and decisions.

They cannot differentiate between good and bad, friend and foe, and positive and negative. Likewise, they cannot distinguish between honour and disgrace, a respectable person and a disreputable person, a master and a slave, a person who is truly wealthy and one who is in true poverty, prosperity and failure, that which is really grief and that which is really comfort. Similarly, they cannot tell the difference between shame and immodesty, knowledge and ignorance, brightness and darkness, vision and blindness, reward and punishment. In essence, it is as though they have made themselves clueless regarding these aspects.