Advice on Marriage

 

Bism Allah wal-hamdulilah
was salatu was salamu 3la Rasool Allah 

Assalmau 3laikum wa rahmat Allah wa barakartu
i pray this reaches all of you and your families in the best of iman and
health and highest spirits of taqwa. 

For those who are married, may Allah subhnahu
wa ta3ala make you the best wives who truly make your husband happy if
he simply looks at you. 

As for those who are not married, may Allah
subhnahu wa ta3ala grant us the most righteous husbands and make us the
most righteous wives,  joining for no other cause than His sake. 

ameen.  thumma ameen.  thumma
ameen.

 

Lecture given by Shaikh Abdallah Adhami:

Advice to Husbands (and Wives) By getting
married you are not just getting a wife, you are getting your whole world.
From now until the rest of your days your wife will be your partner, your
companion, and your best friend.  She will share your moments, your
days, and your years. She will share your joys and sorrows, your successes
and failures, your dreams and your fears.  When you are ill, she will
take the best care of you; when you need help, she will do all she can
for you; when you have a secret, she will keep it; when you need advice,
she will give you the best advice. She will always be with you: when you
wake up in the morning the first thing your eyes will see will be her;
during the day, she will be with you, if for a moment she is not with you
by her physical body, she will be thinking of you, praying for you with
all her heart, mind, and soul; when you go to sleep at night, the last
thing your eyes will see will be her; and when you are asleep you will
still see her in your dreams. In short, she will be your whole world and
you will be her whole world.

The best description that I personally
have ever read describing the closeness of the spouses to each other is
the Quranic verse which says: "they are your garments and you are their
garments" Indeed, spouses are like garments to each other because they
provide one another with the protection, the comfort, the cover, the support,
and the adornment that garments provide to humans. Just imagine a journey
in the winter of Alaska without garments! Our spouses provide us with the
same level of comfort, protection, cover, and support in the journey of
our lives on this earth as garments would do in the Alaska journey.

The relationship between the spouses is
the most amazing of all human relations: the amount of love and affection,
intimacy and closeness, mercy and compassion, peace and tranquility that
fills the hearts of the spouses is simply inexplicable. The only rational
explanation for these most amazing of all human feelings is that: it is
an act of God. Only God Almighty in His infinite power, boundless mercy,
and great wisdom can create and ingrain these amazing feelings in the hearts
of the spouses. In fact God is reminding those who search for His signs
in the universe that these feelings in the hearts of the spouses are among
the signs that should guide humans to His existence as He says in the Quran,"
And among His signs is this, that He created for you mates from among yourselves
that you may dwell in tranquility with them and He has put love and mercy
between your hearts: verily in that are signs for those who reflect"

But the human heart is not a static entity,
it is very dynamic. Feelings can and do change with time. Love may wither
and fade away. The marital bond might weaken if not properly cared for.
Happiness in marriage cannot be taken for granted; continuous happiness
requires constant giving from both sides. For the tree of marital love
to remain alive and keep growing, the soil has to be sustained, maintained,
and nurtured. Remember that our Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him had
found the time to go out to the desert and race with his wife Aisha. She
outstripped him but later after she had gained some weight, he outstripped
her. Remember that the Prophet took his wife to watch the young Ethiopians
playing and dancing their folk dances.

The show of emotions is necessary to keep
the marital bond away from rusting and disintegrating. Remember that you
will be rewarded by God for any emotions you show to your wife as the Prophet
said "one would be rewarded for anything that he does seeking the pleasure
of God even the food that he puts in the mouth of his wife" Never underestimate
the importance of seemingly little things as putting food in your wife's
mouth, opening the car's door for her, etc. Remember that the Prophet used
to extend his knee to his wife to help her ride her camel...

Try to always find some time for both of
you to pray together. Strengthening the bond between you and God is the
best guarantee that your own marital bond would always remain strong. Having
peace with God will always result in having more peace at home. Remember
that the Prophet gave glad tidings for those couples who wake up at night
to pray together. The Prophet even urged the spouse who rises up first
to wake the other spouse up even by throwing cold  water on his/her
face.

Always try your best to be be good to your
wife by words and by  deeds.  Talk to her, smile to her, seek
her advice, ask for her  opinion, spend quality time with her and
always remember that the  Prophet said "the best of you are those
who are best to their wives"  Finally, it is common that spouses vow
to love and honor their  spouses until death do them part. I do believe
that this vow is  good or even great, but not enough! It is not enough
that you love  your wife. You have to love what she loves as well.
Her family,  her loved ones must also become your loved ones. Don't
be like my colleague who was unhappy about his wife's parents coming to
visit  for few weeks. He candidly said to her "I don't like your parents"
Naturally she angrily looked at him straight in the eye and said 
" I don't like yours either"...  Also, it is not enough that you 
love her until death do you part. Love should never end and we do 
believe there is life after death where those who did righteousness 
in this world will be joined by their spouses and offspring. The 
best example in this regard is the Prophet whose love to Khadija 
his wife of 25 years extended to include all those she loved and 
continued even after her death. It was many years after her death 
and he never forgot her and whenever a goat was slaughtered in his 
house he would send parts of it to Khadija's friends and whenever 
he felt that the visitor on the door might be Khadija's sister Hala, 
he would pray saying "O Allah let it be Hala"