My brother is an idiot!

[shuraimfan4lyf]

"Role of parents towards their children in a society that does not help in raising children properly"

Praise be to Allaah.

Firstly:

The success or failure of the Muslim in raising his children depends on a variety of factors, which undoubtedly includes the environment in which they live, which plays a major role in the success or failure of that upbringing.

Please see the answer to question no. 52893.

Secondly:

The parents have to understand that Allaah has given them responsibility over their children, and they have to fulfil the trust as Allaah has enjoined in the Qur’aan. The Sunnah also confirms this command in many saheeh ahaadeeth. The texts of the Revelation also warn the one who does not look after his flock sincerely and who neglects the trust with which Allaah has entrusted him.

It was narrated that Ma’qil ibn Yasaar al-Muzani said: I heard the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) say: “There is no person whom Allaah puts in charge of others, and when he dies he is insincere to his subjects, but Allaah will forbid Paradise to him.”

According to another report: “… and he is insincere towards them, but he will not smell the fragrance of Paradise.” Narrated by al-Bukhaari (6731) and Muslim (142).

See the answer to question no. 20064.

Thirdly:

Allaah has enjoined those who are in charge of children to raise them from when they are very small to obey Allaah and love Islam. Even though they are not accountable because they have not reached puberty, one should not wait until puberty to teach them, guide them and tell them to obey Allaah, because in most cases at that age (i.e. puberty) they will not respond unless they have been brought up in this manner and have learned it from their families since a young age. Hence parents are enjoined to teach young children how to pray from the age of seven and to smack them if they do not pray when they are ten. The Sahaabah used to make their young children fast, so as to get them used to loving Islam and its rituals, so that it would be easy for them to follow its commands and keep away from the things it forbids when they grow up.

It was narrated that ‘Abd-Allaah ibn ‘Amr said: The Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) said: “Teach your children to pray when they are seven years old, and smack them if they do not do so when they are ten, and separate them in their beds.” Abu Dawood (495), classed as saheeh by al-Albaani in Saheeh Abi Dawood.

It was narrated that al-Rubayyi’ bint Mu’awwidh ibn ‘Afra’ said: On the morning of ‘Ashoora’, the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) sent word to the villages of the Ansaar around Madeenah, saying: “Whoever started the day fasting, let him complete his fast, and whoever started the day not fasting, let him complete the rest of the day (without food).”

After that, we used to fast on this day, and we would make our children fast too, even the little ones in sha Allaah. We would make them toys out of wool, and if one of them cried for food, we would give (that toy) to him until it was time to break the fast.

Narrated by al-Bukhaari (1960) and Muslim (1136).

Just as they raise them to do acts of worship, they should also prevent them from doing haraam things. If the child does an act of worship, the reward will be for him and for the one who taught him and encouraged him to do it. As for doing acts of disobedience or sins, the minor does not sin, rather the one who enabled him to do it and left the door open for him to do it and did not close it, is sinning. As for the one who tells him to do it, he is like the one who did it.

Hence it is not something extreme at all if a Muslim raises his children to obey Allaah and prevents them from doing haraam things, such as males wearing gold or silk, or females wearing male clothing, or lying, stealing, swearing and other sins. Similarly, it is not something extreme if a Muslim raises his daughter to be modest and chaste and not to mix, because if a person gets used to something when he is young, there is the fear that he may persist in it.

Ibn al-Qayyim (may Allaah have mercy on him) said:

Even though the child is not accountable, his guardian is, and it is not permissible for him to enable him to do something haraam, for he will get used to it and it will be difficult to wean him from it.

Tuhfat al-Mawdood bi Ahkaam al-Mawlood (p. 162).

And he (may Allaah have mercy on him) said:

The one who neglects to teach his child that which will benefit him and leaves him with no care has done a very bad deed. The corruption of most children is due to their parents and their neglect of (their children), because they neglect to teach them the obligations and Sunnahs of Islam. So they neglected them when they were small, and (the children) turned out unable to benefit themselves or to benefit their parents when they are old.

Tuhfat al-Mawdood, p. 229

The scholars of the Standing Committee were asked:

With regard to my small children, should I teach them the etiquette of Islam and make the young girls wear Islamic clothes, or this regarded as extremism? If my doing this is correct, what is the evidence for it from the Qur’aan and Sunnah?

They replied:

What you have mentioned about making girls wear loose and concealing clothing and making them get used to that from a young age is not extremism, rather you are doing the right thing in giving them an Islamic upbringing.

Shaykh ‘Abd al-‘Azeez ibn Baaz, Shaykh ‘Abd al-Razzaaq ‘Afeefi, Shaykh ‘Abd-Allaah ibn Ghadyaan.

Fataawa al-Lajnah al-Daa’imah (25/285, 286).

In his book Majmoo’ah As’ilah Tuhimm al-Usrah al-Muslimah, Shaykh Muhammad ibn Saalih al-‘Uthaymeen (may Allaah have mercy on him) said:

The scholars say that it is haraam to dress a child in clothes that it is haraam for an adult to wear. Clothing on which there are images is haraam for an adult to wear, so it is also haraam for a child to wear it.

What the Muslims should do is to boycott such clothes and shoes so that those who want to spread evil and corruption will not be able to reach us by these means. If they are boycotted they will never find a way to make them reach this land.

After that, he was asked:

Is it permissible for male children to wear things that are only for females, such as gold and silk, etc, and vice versa?

He replied:

This is to be understood from the first answer. I said that the scholars say that it is haraam to dress a child in clothes that it is haraam for an adult to wear. Based on this, it is haraam to dress male children in that which is only for females, and vice versa.

After that, he was asked:

Does this include isbaal or making clothes come below the ankles for male children?

He replied:

Yes, it includes that. End quote.

And Allaah knows best.

Source

 

[aadil77]

I don't see why everyones crying about the dad hitting him, is there something wrong with disciplining a disobedient child? The guy is 18 years old, he's not gonna cry about or loose confidence

I used to get hit all the time, you just take it, learn from it and move on

 

[Ğħαrєєвαħ]

^Must have not been a good child..
But Anyway, maybe it was because of the way the child was brought up maybe due to the enviroment, i.e.school, friends..etc. Allaah knows best...
Majority of people i know think its wrong to hit a child ,why i think the same "Sometimes"...But still Allaah knows
as am sure there must be another solution....
Im not knowledgable but May Allaah show him the correct path, and make him love his Parents..Ameen

 

[cat eyes]

I don't see why everyones crying about the dad hitting him, is there something wrong with disciplining a disobedient child? The guy is 18 years old, he's not gonna cry about or loose confidence

I used to get hit all the time, you just take it, learn from it and move on

using hitting for little things is to extreme. these little foolish things that teenagers do can be probably sorted out through talking and showing your child fatwa's on why certain things are not allowed.

bringing him to lectures.. spending time with your kids. try to be close to them so they can feel that they can come to the mother or father for anything. there is different types of ways you can

discipline your kid. it dose not have to result to violence and driving your child out of the house and making him feel like an outcast. this is how (i believe) people respect there parents to much because

they thought them about the deen. if a parent ever hits there child, it should be for a major reason because then at least the child understands why his parent done such a thing.

 

[Salahudeen]

since hes only 18 years old. he will do stupid things like this. in fact i don't know what teenager who has not given there parents a hard time but as we mature we start to change and inshaAllah he will

change too but really your parents have to stop being so hard on him. the more they get angry, the more he is going to do stuff to annoy them. when he got his eye brow pierced... your dad handled

that so bad and now you could possibly end up losing your brother because he wants to move out now. one of my brothers friend actually left islam because his parents were hell strict. he actually left

the country to get away from them and now he blames the religion for how he was raised. the prophet mohammad (saw) has warned parents to fear Allah in the treatment of your children. if he was

going to disrespect his mother then just maybe your dad had the right to use his hand but i mean it was just an eye brow piercing, it is extremely small thing that could have been handled better. it is extremely sad indeed.

i hope and pray that things will get better for you and your family inshaAllah

This is exactly what happened with my uncle, now he despises his parents and everything connected to them like Islam.

 

[anonymous]

I don't think my brother hates Islam, he just has a hard time following it himself. Before the situation got really bad, he actually used to pray on his own and makes the little ones to pray.

Anyway, this week has been pretty calm. My parents aren't really upset anymore and there hasn't been any fighting. Inshallah the talk did him well and he will start shaping up. It is true that teenagers do act like this but I just didn't want him to move out and be in a place with no Islamic influence at all.

 

[Ummu Sufyaan]

I think my parents have realized that they’ve done all they can do and at this point just let him go ahead and do whatever he wants to do. I know they tried hard and worked so long to raise us right but they’re not perfect and these things are sometimes out of our control. Inshallah he does find his way back to us.

The thing is he’s so set in his ways, and he just exudes this sort of confidence or arragonce, as if he’s better than everyone else in the house. When my parents used to ask him ‘what will people think of us?’ he’d reply with ‘who cares what they think?’ He doesn’t see himself as irresponsible because like I said he’s working full time plus is a student full time. He’s studying to become a teacher.

As for his home life, we really don’t have much interaction with him because he’s just so different from the rest of us. All of us know what he’s up to and just try to stay clear of his ways. We were closer when we were younger, being only a year apart but of course growing up me being a girl and going through changes we just grew apart. This is also around the time he entered high school and started hanging with a bad crowd.

When my dad when to hajj last year, he told us of his plans to take us all soon and he replied saying that he couldn’t go because he’s not ‘ready’. He knows he’s doing wrong, but is just stuck in the error of his ways. It’s funny because when he is home, he tells the little ones to go pray.
Please keep me and my family in your duas and inshallah things work out.

since your parents are the ones fighting with him, i think its best that someone brefiends him and i think this particular situation will have affect on how he changes becuase whilst one person is his enemy, and another is his friend, that person who is his friend is going to stand out for him and will become like his hero, if you will. once he feels he can relay and trust in someone, he will most likely listen to them and change will occur.

so this is where you come in as someone he used to be close with (or someone in his family he is close to now). rebuild the relationship you used to have. ignore what he is doing wrong dont mention it, completely steer clear from the topic, dont involve yourself with it (if you bring it up, he may feel that yu are judging him and that you are like everyone else) just be someone he can joke with and talk to.

once you feel that your relationship has reached a reasonable level and you feel comfortable talking with him and you felt that he will listen to you, THEN you start giving dawah to him and advise him. of course you do this is subtle ways (especially if he is still sensitive about it) such as offering to pray with him, going to lectures together (having said that though, dotn focus too much on advising him and dont be overbearing about it that the only thing your friendship revolves around is advising him

another way you could get him to open up to you so that you can advise him, is by implementing something that i like to call "blaming yourself FIRST" in other words, you pick situations you (as the person advising him) have been trough and that he can relate to, and through this way he will see that he isn't alone in his hardship...again this builds trust and friend which later can be used for dawah.

for example, with him running off, just say "you know life does get hectic around here, and with all what goes under this roof, i feel like running off and living somewhere else as well" (or whatever the situation maybe for you) "but something that stops me is knowing its going to really hurt mum and dad especially since they are getting old and will feel more lonely with the less people around and knowing that life by myself no matter how tempting it may be, is going to be twice as hard fending for myself." (again, whatever your situation may be).

again, once he sees that you have gone through similar, then a trust and a sort of leniency towards you will develop, making it easy for him to talk to you.

i cant help but feel that one of the reasons why he became rebellious, is that he saw his other siblings getting along and relating to one another, and figured, 'well theres nothing much for me here' and so felt the need to go find that somewhere else and in something that will give him what he didn't receive at home...so the point here, is try to make him feel welcome, offer to involve him in whatever you guys are doing. go eat out together (food always brings people together), play sports together, etc etc.

perhaps he misses the old times but doesn't realize it and again tries to find it someone else. i think as you said as times changed, then so did you guys....you need to bring that back together and have as much interaction with one another as siblings like you did when you were kids.(as long as you dont fear that his bad ways will influence you, i advise you to keep talking to him, etc and not shun him)

with all the life changes you guys all went through, eg studying it would have had some impact (not necessarily bad) on your relationships since you're all busy in doing your own thing and not being around one another as much compared to when you were kids. what im getting at is that you dont have to be talking to someone for a relationship to build, but merely being around them begins to make your heart lenient towards them...so yes, make sure you (and your siblings) have sufficient interaction with your brother.

and when he tells your siblings to pray, tell them to ask him (kindly) to pray with them.

 

[S<Chowdhury]

i don't see why everyones crying about the dad hitting him, is there something wrong with disciplining a disobedient child? The guy is 18 years old, he's not gonna cry about or loose confidence

i used to get hit all the time, you just take it, learn from it and move on

aliiieeeeeeeeee bro some1 is talking sense now haha take the beating like a man, which man would run away and cry and be detached from family over beating?, i admit at da time i was lyk nahhhh how can my dad hit me like that but with good reason i was off the rails worse than this brother here, with hindsight i'm glad my dad gave the beating he did and dragged me away (kicking n screamin) from the haraam stuff. Inshallah things work out 4 your family sis

 

[cuezed]

I know a few people that have taken kids/adults to Pakistan, to put them in a place which is like an institute for 6mnths +, proper lock down and no1 can visit reguarly, it costs a fair bit but it puts them into routine.. prayers are a must and lectures on Islam etc, it works for some and others it dont

this is not a good idea. 2 druggies were sent to my village (not related to my family) back home in mirpur. and they were worse over there. cheap drugs and chilling out. i have heard many people including imams who have recommended not to send bad kids to pakistan.