Guidebook to God
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Ep. 18: "The Best of You is The Best with Families" | Guidebook to God
What is your relationship like with your family? Learn about the importance of strong familial ties in Islam.
Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. The Best of Us Are the Best with Our Families The best of us are the best with our families, subhanAllah. One of the greatest things that I think is forgotten by many of us is that the greatest capacity to please Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is not meant to be experienced by those who are foreign to us and those who are distant from us. The greatest qualities that you and I seek to have as our characteristics, the place they should be practiced, taught, shown the most in our life is with our families. With our fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, wives and husbands. And that's something that you see as a regular theme with the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wasallam. One of the first things that I want to say about this is khayrukum khayrukum li ahli. The best of you are the best of you with your families. And the Prophet speaks this to fathers of course and husbands to be really good with their children, really good with their spouses. But it's also equally important to understand that this word was not limited to them, but it's also meant to be reciprocated by those who they show goodness to. And therefore when you hear the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam about his life and his lifestyle, you hear from those who were the first people to accept Islam were the people who were nearest to him. They were the people who met him and knew him inside out. They were the people who were the first to believe in him. His wife Khadija radiallahu anha, his cousin Ali ibn Abi Talib who was far younger than him, his best friend Abu Bakr as-Siddiq and his best friend Uthman. It was people who lived in his home who he had adopted. Zaid, who used to be referred as Zaid ibn Muhammad. And until Allah said no, refer him back to his own father. The people who accepted Islam in the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam were those who saw and experienced kindness from him, goodness from him in a capacity, in a way, that was not experienced by maybe those who were away from him.
And I want this to be a guiding light for my life and your life. That whenever you want to please Allah the most, begin with those who are near you. In fact, Allah structures the Qur'an in that way and its delivery. So the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, when he first revealed, the Qur'an was first revealed to him, Allah says, وَأَنذِرْ عَشِيرَتَكَ الْأَقْرَبِينَ Let this Qur'an be revealed to you and the first people you share it with are your Ashira, your innermost family, the nearest to you, your friends and companions, those who are the most important to you. The next stage, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says to the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, convey this message, لِأُمَّ الْقُرَىٰ وَمِنْ حَوْلَهَا To the city that you live in, the village that you live in, Mecca al-Mukarramah and the surrounding hills. And then Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says, النَّاسِ أَجْمَعِينَ أَرْصَلْنَاكَ لِلنَّاسِ كَافَةً I sent you to all humanity, Ya Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wasallam. And therefore it shows you the importance of showing love and mercy and contentment to those who are nearest to us and moving outward. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala also made it that our neighbors, you know, they're not even blood relatives, but our neighbors who are within our جَارِذِ القُرْبَىٰ The neighbor who is nearest to you, Muslim or not. In one beautiful hadith of Abdullah ibn Amr ibn al-'As, narrated in Sahih al-Bukhari, it was the day of Eid, and he ordered that the قُربَان be cut, and then he said, قَالَ لِلسَّلَّخِ He said to the butcher, once you butchered the meat and you're going to distribute it to everyone in the city, قَالَ لِلسَّلَّخِ بِدَأْ بِجَارِي الْيَهُودِي Begin with my neighbor, the Jewish family. So the butcher was surprised. He said, there's so many Muslims that live here. أَبِي جَارِكَ الْيَهُودِي Should I really give it to your Jewish neighbor first? He said, كَذَلِكَ كَانَ وَعَلَّمَنَا رَسُولُ الله صَلَىٰ سَلَّمُ This is how the Prophet was and how he taught us, صلى الله عليه وسلم. In one of the authentic hadith also in Bukhari, the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم,
when he did the official slaughtering of the day of Eid, he gave meat to his neighbor who was a Jewish man, صلى الله عليه وسلم. And I want you to pay attention to that. So our neighborhood, our community, our family, those who are nearest to you have more right to you than those who are distant from you. Your school, your friends, your classmates, your family, your cousins, your aunts, right? It means that Allah سبحانه وتعالى has set our inner family that صلة الرحم, connecting the ties that bind us as being something that's significant, that your aunt from your mother's side is as significant as your own mother. He said, صلى الله عليه وسلم, الخالة والدة, your mother's sister, it's as if she gave birth to you. And all of that goes to reinforce the importance of doing good to our families, that our charity should begin with them, our kindness should begin with them, our invitation should begin with them. And therefore, for you and I, so for example, your blood brother, your sister, they become the most important person to you, even in comparison to your cousins. So I grew up with, and this is not a hadith of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم, but it's a cultural trait. So I remember, you know, my father, he would teach me, he would say, وإنت وخوك على ابن عمك, if there's an argument and it's your cousin and you, then it's you and your brother, you face your cousin, because you are brothers. وإنت وابن عمك على الغريب, but it's you and your cousin against any other stranger. And therefore, there's fidelity to those who are near us, fidelity to those who are a part of our families and our homes. The first people who should receive the بركة of our دعاة, the first people who we should gather for our prayers, the first people who come to mind, should be our wives, our husbands, our fathers, and our mothers. Learn this from the dua of the great prophets of Allah. What is the dua of Ibrahim that's recorded in his Qur'an?
All of us know this dua. رَبِّ جَعَلْنِي مُقِيمَ الصَّلَاةَ وَمِن ذُرِّيَّتِي Oh Allah, make me one who is consistent in my prayer and my children and their children's children. رَبَّنَا وَتَقَبَّلْ دُعَاةً Oh Allah, answer this dua for me. رَبَّنَا اغْفِرْ لِي وَلِي وَالِيَّ وَلِي الْمُؤْمِنِينَ يَوْمَ يَقُومُوا الْحِسَابُ Oh Allah, forgive me and forgive my parents and the believers on the day of accounting and judgment. Why is this such a powerful dua? Well, it gives you both important parts. The family that is to come and the family that you lived with in the past. So as a young man, as a young woman, the most important people in your life are your father and your mother, your brothers, your sisters, your aunts, your uncles. They become the nucleus of your family and no one will ever love you, will ever care for you, will ever seek for you goodness more than your family and those who are nearest to you. Even when there are difficulties and trials and hardship, they will always be a part of your home. And the general maxim is, as we hear always, blood is thicker than water and that is a reality and truth. And we should honor the fidelity that we have with our families, friends, communities in that sense. But also we should also include those who are outside our bloodlines, outside our families, that there is the fidelity of brotherhood of Islam. The Prophet ﷺ used to link Muslim people together when they were those who were isolated from other people. And therefore my allegiance is to the word of Allah ﷻ. And Allah ﷻ says, لَا تَجِدُ قَوْمًا يُؤْمِنُونَ بِاللَّهِ وَالْيَوْمِ الْآخِرِ يُوَادُّونَ مَنْ حَادَ اللَّهَ وَرَسُولَهَ وَلَوْ كَانُوا آبَاءَهُمْ أَوْ أَبْنَاءَهُمْ أَوْ عَشِيرَتَهُمْ You will never find those who truly believe in Allah, the final day, that they will go headlong in support of their fathers, brothers, family,
if they are in combat with Allah and against the Messenger Muhammad ﷺ. That is where our allegiance comes to a halt. We continue to remind them of the truth, invite them to good, but our allegiance must always be to the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of the Nabi Muhammad ﷺ in seeking good for ourselves and our families and others. May Allah ﷻ make us the best of people by being good to our families, homes and communities. وصلِّ اللَّهُمَّ وَسَلِّمْ وَزِدْ وَبَارِكْ عَلَى سَيِّدِنَا وَنَبِيِّنَا مُحَمَّدٍ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمْ This is your brother Yahya Ibrahim. As-salāmu ʿalaykum wa-rahmatullāhi wa-barakātuh.
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