Good Manners (Part 1 of 3)

For two years, I have faithfully been watching this wonderful series presented by Mustafa Hosny called “Khadooka Faqaloo” or “They Decieved you and Said”, which focuses on highlighting major misconceptions that can be found in the Islamic world. A month and a half ago marked the beginning of season three. Inspired by one of my friends, I decided that this time I would try to write down what episodes really impacted me and share them with others. To be honest, I added a bit of my own flavor to certain parts but the majority of all of the ideas were presented by him.

They Deceived You and Said…

Episode 2:  (Misconception) It does not matter how you treat others so long as you respect and love Allah …

This article is divided into three parts. Part 1 focuses on highlighting the hadiths that show how important good manners are in Islam. Part 2 focuses on explaining why Islam plays such a high emphasis on good manners. Part 3 focuses on why there is absolutely no excuse not to treat others with good manners.

A young man once asked his manager if he could pay him a personal visit. The manager agreed and they set an appropriate day. When he heard the sound of a car approaching, the manager quickly went to his window to make sure his children had gotten off the street and were playing safely on the sidewalk.  Peering from behind the curtain, he saw his employee step out of his car. It was obvious the employee had dressed up for the occasion, and the manager could see he was carrying a beautifully wrapped gift that looked expensive. The manager smiled, but his smile soon turned to a frown. Seemingly oblivious to the manager’s gaze, the employee had brushed himself off and had begun walking towards the door. He screamed at the manager’s young kids to stop making noise and to find some other street to play in. When the young girl tried to speak up, the employee scolded her harshly to mind her manners. He screamed at her to move. When she refused to budge from her place, he pushed his way in front of her. Needless to say, the manager was not happy at all. He opened the door without waiting for the employee to knock. He was disturbed to see that his employee had a huge smile on his face, as if seconds earlier he hadn’t just been screaming. The manager could not take any more of his employee’s hypocrisy so he told the young man that he had been watching from the window. The young man did not even cringe. The manger looked at the young man and asked him why he’d been so harsh with his children when they had merely been playing. The employee shocked him when he answered that he’d known he was being watched and he was aware they were his manager’s kids (he’d seen their picture in the office), but he really could not understand why the manager was so upset. He’d come on time with a beautiful gift and he really wanted to talk to the manager. He asserted that he truly respected the manager and hoped they could become great friends. The manager coldly looked at the young man and told him, “How dare you think that you can come to my home and insult my own children and think that I will welcome you into my house? You claim that you respect me but you show no respect to my children, who I love. No matter how expensive your gift is, it cannot erase how you treated my daughter.” And with that, he closed the door.

It isn’t that difficult to realize that the above story is an analogy, though Allah, the Exalted, is beyond compare. It’s also quite easy to dismiss the young man’s behavior as beyond believable. The reality, however, is that many of us fall into the same trap that the young man fell into; we mistakenly believe that we can have a very deep relationship with Allah (one based on mutual love and respect) regardless of how we treat His Slaves, or our fellow brothers and sisters. Like the man in the story above, we wrongly assume that so long as we try to give Allah His rights, it does not matter how we treat anyone else. We wrongly believe Allah will overlook the fact we slandered someone, insulted another, spoke rudely to a third, etc because after all, we pray on time and give extra money to charity. And when we do begin to feel a little guilty, many of us try to brush it off by telling ourselves that our next “Hajj” will make us return completely free without any sin. Unfortunately, this type of thinking is utterly wrong.

The Prophet’s Entire Mission…In one single sentence!

To begin with, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) summarized his whole mission (and obviously since he was the final messenger, the mission of the thousands of messengers before him) in one single line: inama bathtoo li atimoo makarim al akhlaq (English translation below).

“Verily, I was sent for no other reason, except to perfect the noble traits of character”. It can be found in Imam Malik’s Al Mutawwa.

Good manners, then, are the essence of Islam. To further prove this point, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said that those who will be closest to him on the Day of Judgment are those with the best manners. That’s right… the Prophet  did not say that those who prayed the most, read the most Quran, fasted the highest number of days, or performed the highest number of pilgrimages. No doubt that all of those acts of worship are important, but the Prophet, who only said what Allah would inspire him to say, chose to say that those closest to him would be the ones with the best manners.  Clearly, Allah (swt), then cares more about how we treat each other than what we try to do to please Him in terms of acts of worship. It is no wonder, then, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) also said that what will weigh the heaviest on the scale on the Day of Judgment are our good manners because that is what Allah values the most.

Three Instances

Although these three hadiths should be enough to radically change how we look at Allah’s Slaves, there are three instances in the Prophet’s life that also clearly demonstrate how important it is to treat others courteously. These were not three ordinary instances. They were fundamental instances in which the Prophet addressed thousands of people. When he had thousands of eyes watching him, what did the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) choose to emphasize? Of all the things he could have chosen to emphasize including aspects related to Muslim creed and acts of worship, he chose to emphasize what he knew was the secret of making us true believers: good manners…

1. The first instance happened when he arrived in Medina, after his flight from Mecca. All of the people in Medina had been anticipating his arrival and for days they’d been keeping an eye for him from the very morning to the very night. When the Prophet (pbuh) arrived and saw them, he said: “Oh people, spread salaam [greetings], feed the poor, keep your ties of kinship, and pray at night”. This was the very first thing he said to the new and beginning Islamic state. Of the four things he commanded the people to do, three of them all relate to how we treat others.
2. The second instance was when the Prophet was at Hajj. He gathered the one hundred thousand people with him and gave a khutba or sermon. When we look at the entire contents of the sermon, most of it relates to good manners and taking care of each other. He warned the people that as sacred as the Kaaba was on that holy day in that holy month, every single Muslim is sacred in the eyes of Allah. The Prophet emphasized that a Muslim’s blood, money, and reputation are all sacred and should not be touched. His speech also emphasized how interest is a terrible thing (because of how it abuses someone’s need) and the fact that women should be treated well.
3. The final and third instance happened before his death. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) gathered the people. Too tired to stand, he sat in his mimbar (pulpit) and then began to speak. He told the people gathered that if he had ever tainted someone’s reputation, insulted someone, taken someone’s money, or hurt someone, that they were free to take their right from him. He offered them his back and told them to take their due without any fear that he would be upset. Of course, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) never insulted someone or offended someone. He did this, however, to emphasize that no one should want to meet their Lord if they have not treated His Slaves properly.

Thus, in all of these three instances, the Prophet emphasized how we treat others. When he had everyone’s attention and in the most important instances, the Prophet was preoccupied with promoting good manners. He was so concerned with good manners that he tied it with imaan, or belief. The Prophet said

“None of you believe until he loves for his brother what he loves for himself”.

Many think this refers only to material things but it also refers to how we treat others. Just like we all like to be treated with respect and courteously, we should treat others with the same respect and politeness we want to be treated with.

Broke….on the Day of Judgment!

Perhaps the scariest hadith which shows how serious the issue is is the famous hadith in which the Prophet asked “Who is the penniless person?” To his Companions’ surprise, the Prophet asserted that it is not the person who does not have money but the person who comes on the Day of Judgment having done good deeds but having insulted someone, stolen from another, hurt a third, etc so that his good hasanaat are given to those he offended as a recompense. The Prophet also explained that once the person’s good deeds had been completely distributed and he had nothing else to give, he’d be forced to take the bad deeds (sayyat) of those he’d offended. Here, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) could not have made it any clearer that Allah will not forgive a person who treats His Servants badly until they have been given their rights. It becomes even more hair raising, when we remember the fact these people have hasanaat to give, meaning that they were among the mootaqeen or “God fearing” since Allah only accepts acts of worship done by those who fear Him. Because they have hasanat to give, He clearly accepted these people’s acts and rewarded them for it. Still, their acts were ultimately fruitless because they failed to realize that Allah does not excuse believers when they trample on the rights of others.

Tied to this is the fact that of the 76 sins Imâm Adh-Dhahabî listed as “major” or kaabir, only half relate to acts of worship or creed. The remaining half relate to how we treat others, including behaving poorly with our parents, stealing, giving false testimonies, etc. Again, these are all the “major” or “gravest” sins. [1]

Wanna Know if Allah Loves You?

Perhaps one of the most powerful hadiths that shows how truly important good manners are is the one in which Allah reveals that if He loves a servant, He calls out to all those in the sky to love him too and He makes the people on Earth love him. That is, if a person wants to know whether or not Allah loves him, he should first ask himself whether or not his fellow human beings think highly of him or not. It is very unlikely that they will think well of him if he does not treat them politely.

Allah (Exalted and Sublime is He) is so concerned with emphasizing common courtesy that His messenger tells us not to go the mosque and pray “jamaah” if we’ve eaten garlic because we could offend someone’s sense of smell. In other words, as much as Allah loves for us to pray in the mosque together, He is more Concerned with how we would feel than with what He loves. Thus, His Messenger essentially forbade us from going to the mosque when we could offend someone else there.

Read Part 2

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[1] If you would like to read more about the major sins, check out http://www.islaam.net/main/display.php?category=32)