Divorce – The Role Of Parents. As parents, we will most likely play a role in the success or failure of our children’s marriage, whether we like it or not.
In the name of Allah most Beneficient ever Merciful
At the outset, we need to fully understand the importance of a marriage and recognize that we would be giving our children one of the most cherished gifts of life if we can assist and guide them towards having a successful marriage.
Our Holy Prophet Muhammad Salallahu Alayhe Wasallam has stressed marriage by saying that this is His way and those that do not marry are not of him. He also said that marriage is half of faith.
Most parents today stress on guiding their children towards secular education, earning money and building a career.
Now consider this: our adult child being very wealthy but divorced with two children as opposed to our child not earning all that much but still married with two children and living a stable life.
Of a certainty, the second result is far better. Money does not mean happiness but a successful marriage with healthy children will certainly bring joy and happiness or at the very least save the couple from the agony of a painful divorce, uncertain future and emotionally scarred children.
This shows how important religion is. It has lots of pertinent teachings about marriage in contrast to having very little or nothing about careers and earning money. Religion is guiding us towards true happiness.
As parents, we therefore, need to change the way we orientate our children. Our emphasis must never be money and careers but rather we must guide them towards our religion and becoming Allah-conscious. If this becomes the goal of our children, they would be kind hearted, good people who will most likely have successful relationships.
As an example; an all important part of our religion is attaining faith (‘Emaan’) and our religion teaches that if we want ‘Emaan’, we have to love for others what we love for ourselves. If we instill this in our children then they would end up being good, kind, considerate spouses which would help them greatly in making a success of their marriages. Insha-Allah.
Other important points to remember:
One – There are many sayings across different religions and cultures that teaches: ” What we sow is what we will reap“. How we are, will determine how our children end up. So we too, must never be hung up on material things but we must try to be good, kind, caring, loving, considerate people with everyone around us.
If we have been through a divorce or if we have failing relationships with those around us and we are peoplee who fight with our siblings, neighbors and others, this is what our children will learn and they will most likely end up having broken relationships just as we do. Would any parent want one of their children to fight and disagree with the other…
In correcting this, we have to constantly reflect over how we conduct ourselves with others. We have to realise, admit and accept our mistakes, and once we do, we must seek Allah’s pardon and tell our children that we have made some mistakes in life (and we all do) and they must learn from this and try to do better.
As parents, especially mothers, we must be careful not to build our lives around our children so much so, that it becomes a problem should they do something different to what we would like or expect them to do. We should guide them but we must be able to accept whatever choices they make even if it is not what we would prefer.
Two – How would we react if someone treats our children badly. Definitely, we will not like it. In the same vein, we have to be extremely careful as to how we treat our children’s spouses especially when they’re having marital issues. We have to be unbiased, or better still, treat them better than our own children. Islam teaches us to be just even if it is against ourselves.
Three – As fathers: We need to be careful especially when it comes to our daughters. They will certainly come with issues at some point or the other in their marriage. We have to be extremely careful and not allow our soft spot for them to overrule our judgement. We simply cannot blow a fuse but we have to be cool, we have to listen, to ask questions, to think, to put ourselves in our son’s in law shoes.
We cannot blindly take our daughter’s part but we must rather encourage her towards listening to her husband and working towards winning over his family too. She has to understand that winning one small fight is not as important as the long term success of her marriage.
Caring for our daughters is not about taking her side against her husband but it must be about helping her to succeed in her marriage. This is long term happiness.
However, as fathers, we have to stand up for what is right according to our religion and if this means correcting our son’s in law when they are wrong, we must be able to do this too. Here too, our reaction must be planned and not a wild outburst of anger.
Four – Mothers, it’s going to be very difficult to let go of your sons. For years you took care of them and provided them with their favorite foods. You know precisely how they tick. It’s going to be tough not to interfere in your son’s marriage but you simply have to let go if you want them to be happy and successful and all mums want their sons to be happy ultimately.
Five – As mothers, letting go of our sons also entails having to refrain from putting our daughter’s in-law down. They are going to do things differently and we must accept this. We have to always look on the bright side and not look for faults. If we want to still be close to our sons in this part of their lives then we have to win over their spouses too.
Six – We have to teach our children that every marriage comes with difficulties and the only way to make a success of marriage is to accept and learn from their mistakes and try to put them right in future. Marriage is not a bed of roses and and it is normal, healthy and expected that every couple will face problems every so often. It’s therefore, important for them to learn about how to handle such conflicts.:
This is how we humans learn. If we are making or cooking something , we should pay attention to our faults and improve on them the next time round.. We must teach our children to apply this to their married lives too.
Our Spiritual Guide, Hazrath Poona Wale Shah Saab RA used to say “Laro, laro, ghee bhar khar laro magar bijro nahi” (fight, fight to your hearts content but never seperate). This is an excellent teaching that they should apply to all relationships.
Our children need to know that when they solve these problems, their relationship will get better and stronger. Marital fights and arguments are actually steps that will bring them closer to true love, Insha-Allah.
Seven – Teach our children that if they are still having issues after having tried to solve them by dialog, they need to seek some advice from trusted and mature family members, people that are fair and good and also successful at relationships in their own lives. They must never feel shy to seek advice and help because our marriages are extremely important.
“If ye fear a breach between them twain, appoint (two) arbiters, one from his family, and the other from hers; if they wish for peace, Allah will cause their reconciliation: For Allah hath full knowledge, and is acquainted with all things.” Al Quran 4:35
Discussing issues with others to determine the way forward (shura) is an important teaching of the Holy Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu Alayhe Wa-Aalihi Wasallam. When we do this with good intentions, Allah SWT will bring about reconciliation. Insha-Allah.
We must encourage our children to go all out to make a success of marriage. When and if they reach the point where they require intervention, they must take heed and be willing to make adjustments to accommodate their partner. Now, even more so, because they sought outside help, they should make all necessary sacrifices to make a success of it. As the saying goes, marriage is about compromise!
Eight – An important point to teach our sons; Islam teaches that the husband is the head of the family and the most important aspect of a leader is to never lose his cool no matter what. If a husband has a problem with his wife, there are different steps to take to put things right such as explaining and explaining again… and again. Do it with good cheer and a laugh.
If that fails, try separating beds. Here too, keep the lines of communication open.. “See what you are making me do, honey. You are making me upset and I cannot be with you”
Nine – We need to teach our daughters that the husband being the head of the household is that which is prescribed by our Creator and it is the way to success. There is absolutely nothing wrong in following. On the contrary, it is a very important skill to learn in our journey to knowing Allah SWT. In following others, we are learning to control our passions to eventually become masters of ourselves.
Ten – You must have heard some parent or the other saying that we have to prepare our daughter for a career in case her marriage does not work out. This is wrong and it could result in a whole lot of issues.
The next step to this negetive thinking is that we parents or our daughters would want the best careers. Top careers comes with a whole lot of sacrifices that a person has to make, longer study time, time consuming hours of work.
This does not go well with child bearing which demands the complete attention of a mother for at least two years. Motherhood is a full time job and being a mother is the best, most rewarding job.
And if our daughters earn more than their husband this may become an issue at some point. It goes against team work; mine is mine… yours is yours. I am putting more into our marriage than you.
Men and women working together is asking for problems. A career woman is going to have to interact with other men and this is begging for problems on another level..
Men and women need each other, they compliment one another and we should not be training them to live independent lives but rather, we should be teaching them to value the other half of ourselves and work as a team.
If our daughters have good careers then they could more easily push for a divorce over the smallest disagreement because of their independance and this is a mega sin.
It was narrated from Ibn ‘Abbas that the Prophet (ﷺ) said: “No woman asks for divorce when it is not absolutely necessary, but she will never smell the fragrance of paradise, although its fragrance can be detected from a distance of forty years’ travel. ” Ibn Maja
Eleven – Every child is different and as we get older our experiences with our younger children are so much better. So we must encourage our children to grow their famalies but at the same time they need to respect the two year weaning period that every child needs. Also, it is a strain on the mother and she must be happy with having another child. Children will also draw the couple closer together. Insha-Allah.
So as parents of marriagable children, the role we play is a vital one in the success or failure of their marriages and we should take our role as parents seriously and offer them guidance by teaching them from an early age how to be tolerant, how to be kind, loving and caring, to all around us, most especially those closest to us.
Most importantly, The Golden rule: if we teach our children to live their lives according to Islam and use Islam as the guiding light, they will most likely succeed. Insha-Allah! END