* Beautiful Love *

I AM WAITING

Bismillah.

For the first time I think of writing a bit about this here; yes, I am now 4months ++ pregnant. Allah gives me this beautiful blessing and I really pray that I’m not gonna make it worthless. I ask Allah to help me becoming a good mother, so that I can give the best to my children. And the best gift I can offer them is no other than the teachings of Islam itself.

However, a friend’s statement hurriedly flashes my mind. She said, being a solehah and loving mother to our kids is certainly not a very hard task to be accomplished, it’s merely because such character is an inborn to us- women. Indeed, a harder thing to be achieved (as a woman) is to become a very good wife.

A SOLEHAH WIFE

Oh my God, it is very true! I am experiencing it and I know how much sacrifices I had to carry out in order to teach myself to be a solehah wife to my husband. Especially in this early days of marriage, when I had to accept that I have to share a life with someone I’ve never spent a living with before. And to think that I am to accept him for whoever he is and it is a must to me to help him creating this marriage as a path leading towards Jannah. I remember one beautiful quote regarding marriage:

A beautiful marriage consists of husband and wife helping each other to attain paradise.

Subhaanallah! And also, these two beautiful reminders will always stay in my mind:

(*) The true Muslim woman is always obedient to her husband, provided that no sin is involved. She is respectful towards him and is always eager to please him and make him happy. If he is poor, she does not complain about his being unable to spend much. She does not complain about her housework, because she remembers that many of the virtuous women in Islamic history set an example of patience, goodness and a positive attitude in serving their husbands and taking care of their homes despite the poverty and hardships they faced.

(*) The true Muslim woman devotes herself to taking care of her house and husband. She knows her husband’s rights over her, and how great they are, as was confirmed by the Prophet’s words:

“If I were to order anyone to prostrate to anyone else, I would have ordered women to prostrate to their husbands” [1]

---> these two reminders are taken from a writing by Dr. Muhammad ‘Ali Al-Hashimi, entitled The Ideal Muslimah and Her Husband, an excerpt from the Book “The Ideal Muslimah: The True Islâmic Personality of the Muslim Woman as Defined in the Qur’ân and Sunnah."

(Translated by Nasiruddin Al-Khattab and Revised by Ibrahim M. Kunna and Abu Aya Sulaiman Abdus-Sabur Copyright and published by the International Islâmic Publishing House (IIPH), Riyadh, Saudi Arabia in 1999.)

WHAT THEY SAID ABOUT MARRIAGE

Lately, I’ve been silently agitated with one phenomenon; spreading so-called ‘jokes’ portraying the crumbling of love after marriage. It can easily be found in this virtual world, in blogs, facebook, forums, etc, there will be somebody who’d love to post articles on that topic. I bet each one of us had read at least one of them. For example, a joke about how the husband is getting annoyed with his wife after many years of marriage, compared to his attitude towards her during their lovey-dovey time before they tied the knot.

It might happen in the reality, but to think that some people are making fun of the halal relationship, it somehow makes me sad. And in fact, such jokes will gradually make people feel afraid to enter the world of marriage. Some even say that marriage is the grave of love. Ouchhh! If you are a Muslim, please know that such idea is very hazardous, because it makes you wanna stay [like forever] in that relationship which normally leads to sins! Na’udzubillah.

BEAUTIFUL EXAMPLE

As usual, Islam never leaves a matter of life without explaining on it or gives examples about it. And for marriage, we have our Prophet Shollallahu Alaihi Wasallam and his wives as the role model. The beautiful love between them is portrayed in many hadith. People might not know about this or not read much about this issue, and they end up establishing a marriage which is far from Islamic teachings.

By the way, I am not here to give lectures about marriage in Islamic perspective; instead I just wanna share some hadith regarding the love in the marriage shown by the Prophet Shollallahu Alaihi Wasallam and his spouses. I want people to know that Islam never forbids love between men and women; indeed, Islam values it and gives it an honorable and proper way to be expressed, which is through marriage. I want people to throw away the thinking that getting married stops you from giving & receiving love in a beautiful form. If you read these hadith, then you’ll surely aware that all the actions stated there can never be applied by those without marriage. But wait, before listing the hadith, I’ll put here one Quranic verse which is I think is very popular when marriage topic is discussed:


So, here are the hadiths:

1. Narrated by Aishah: “I applied perfume to Allah’s Messenger (sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) with these two hands of mine when he entered ihram and when he concluded it, before he performed tawaf,” - and she spread her hands. [2]

2. “When Allah’s Messenger (sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) was in i’tikaf, he inclined his head towards me and I combed his hair, and he did not enter the house except to answer the call of nature.” [3]

3. “I used to wash the Prophet’s head when I was menstruating.” [4]

4. “ Allah’s Messenger (sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) said: ‘May Allah have mercy on the man who gets up at night to pray and wakes up his wife to pray, and if she refuses, he sprinkles water in her face. And may Allah have mercy on the woman who gets up at night to pray, and wakes her husband up to pray, and if he refuses, she sprinkles water in his face.” [5]

5. When Aisha (ra) would drink water from a cup, Prophet (sal Allahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) would place his lips at the same place where she had placed her lips, and drink from it. [6]

6. Narrated Aisha RA: The Prophet used to lean on my lap and recite Qur'an while I was in menses. [7]

How sweet, isn't it? Of course, Islam is beautiful. May we'll always refer to our two main sources (Quran & Sunnah) rather than glorifying others' cultures which sometimes are not in line with the Islamic teachings.

Wallahua'lam.


Footnotes:

[1] A hasan sahih hadith, narrated by Tirmidhi, 2/314, in Abwab a-rida’, 10.
[2] Fath al-Bari, 3/585, Kitab al-Hajj, bab al-tibb.
[3] Sahih Muslim, 3/208, Kitab al-hayd, bab jawaz ghusl al-ha’id ra’as zawjiha wa tarjiluhu.
[4] Fath al-Bari, 1/403, Kitab al-hayd, bab mubashirah al-ha’id; Sahih Muslim, 3/209, Kitab al-hayd, bab jawaz ghusl al-ha’id ra’as zawjiha.
[5] Reported by Abu Dawud, 2/45, in Kitab al-salah: bab qiyam al-layl, and by al-Hakim 1/309, Kitab salah al-tatawwu’; he said that it is sahih according to the consitions of Muslim.
[6] Sahih Muslim.
[7] Sahih Bukhari, Volume 1, Book 6, Number 296.