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Fajr Reminders - Mahmood Habib Masjid and Islamic Center

Fajr Reminders - Mahmood Habib Masjid and Islamic Center

By: Fajr Reminders - Mahmood Habib Masjid and Islamic Center
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 We came to give, not to take. Islam Spirituality
Episodes
  • Parenting skills #2 – Connect to Allahﷻ

    Parenting skills #2 – Connect to Allahﷻ
    Dec 6 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honour of the Prophet and the messengers. And peace and blessings be upon the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, and upon his family and his companions. After that, my brothers and sisters, we talked about the overall background, the reason why parenting, conscious and thoughtful parenting is absolutely critical. Parenting is not something that will happen by default, it's not something that will happen because you want it. It is something you have to work on. And it starts with having a dream for your child, which is a shared dream. So it has to be a three-way conversation, the father, the mother and the child together. So the first one, connect to Allah . The training of connecting to Allah begins with tahajjud. Make tahajjud fardh on yourself. Right? If you want to raise good children, make tahajjud fardh on yourself. Don't let a single day pass starting from tonight. That you have not prayed at least two rakats of time. No matter what, whether you are well, you are sick or whatever, you are travelling, not travelling, doesn't matter. I'm not talking fiqh, I'm talking here the hope of Allah . Make tahajjud fardh on yourself. This is what will give your children, that's the connection. I mentioned this story many times before. And I'm mentioning it now again because I see a lot of new faces. You might not have heard this story from me. My earliest memory of my father, Anandul Ali. These were the days before plastics. There were no plastics. Chairs were made of wood. Glasses were made of glass, not of plastic. And so on. So we lived in, where we lived in India. In a big house. But this was the day, this was the days before. I'm talking about the late 50s. So it's the days before hot and cold running water. There were no geysers and so forth. Water used to be heated outside. Then brought inside. But tahajjud time there is no one to heat the water and bring it. So cold water. Every day around 2.30 or something, I would hear the sound of the metal bucket in the bathroom. You had bucket of GI, galvanized iron. It had a handle. So my father would put it on the floor, would tank. Then he would drop the handle, it would blank. So that was my father getting ready to make wudu. Then he would make wudu. Then he would pray tahajjud. And we could hear him. When he was, he would pray in the other room. Where we were sleeping. The main room. But he would, we could hear his recitation. And when he finished and his duas. Yeah. To this day I live by those duas. And then he would finish that. Then he would sit and read Quran. So he would hear him reciting Quran. Then at the time of salatul fajr, when the time comes to fajr, he would come inside. Turn on the lights and say, salatul khairu minna naum. And he would pull out blankets off. You're a little kid, you hated that. But that's how we, there's no option. There's no option of not getting up for salatul fajr. Whether you are five years old or you are eight years old or you are ten years old, makes no difference. You get up for salatul fajr and you play salatul fajr by jama'at. We lived very far from masjid. So my father would do the imamat. I would call the adhan. And the children would pray. Behind that, my mother and our sisters. No option. There's no question of, oh, chota bachcha hai sora. No, no, no, no. No chota bachcha. You are going to wake up for salatul fajr and you will pray by jama'at khalas. It's not a matter open for any discussion. This is how you raise children. You want someone. You want your child to cry in the night. Cry in the night for you when you are in your grave. Raise them like this. Teach them to take from the treasure of the parna. And another, give them memories. Give your children memories. When they think about things, good things, let them think of you. Another one of these. My father again. My brother and I, you know, we travel a lot and so on. Sometimes you have some problems, some issue. So, you would phone him. And tell him, papa, this thing matters here. This thing we have to do. Some issue we need. He would say, theek hai. Mai pakad leta unku. Diyen hai tak chhoda nahi. Huh? You say, okay. I will hold on to him. I will not leave him until he gives you. Who is this? Who will you hold on? Huh? You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. to give medicines to people. He would treat them. He would not take the fees. Then he would also give the money to buy medicines. So, I told him, how is this? What kind of? It's supposed to be a business. All your colleagues and all your contemporaries, they've got big nursing homes and they're making money and so on. And you know, alhamdulillah, his diagnosis, Allah had given him so much. I've never seen clinical diagnosis like my father's. ...
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  • Parenting skills #1

    Parenting skills #1
    Dec 5 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the kind and the kind of messengers and messengers. Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him and his family. Peace and blessings be upon him and his family. After that, my brothers and sisters, we talked about the overall background, the reason why parenting, conscious and thoughtful parenting is absolutely critical. Parenting is not something that will happen by default. It's not something that will happen because you want it. It is something you have to work on. And it starts with having a dream for your child, which is a shared dream. So, it has to be a three-way conversation. The father, the mother and the child together. Have the conversation with regard to what you want this child to become and why. And the child must be... the prime mover behind that. The child should want it. And you as a parent must support that. And if you feel that the child wants something which is inappropriate or which you think is not the right thing, then it is your job, with love and with understanding to guide the child to where you think the child should be. And again, be very careful and clear in this. It is not always that you have the right answers. You may not have the right answers. But you can try to find ways to help them. And so, having that level of humility to know that the child also has an understanding… And at the end of the day, the child… If you really want the child to exceed… and excel… then that will happen only if the child… is herself or himself completely committed to that goal. And that commitment cannot be forced. So, that's a very important thing to understand. Commitment cannot be forced. Commitment has to come from inside. If you want the commitment to come, then you have to spend the time and the energy behind it. Now, let me talk about what I call the six rules of Islamic parenting, because we are talking about parenting from an Islamic context. And as I mentioned before, these are important because this is something that we will be questioned about by Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala when we meet Allah. As I said before, to be a parent, to have a child is not a blessing. Allah never used the word niyamah for children. Allah used the word fitrah, which means test. So a child is a test. And if you pass the test, then it becomes a niyamah. But by itself, it's not a niyamah. If the child, if you fail in that test, then may Allah have mercy on us, the children can become the opposite of niyamah. So they can be a sadaqah jariyat, they can be a niyamah for you, or they can be the opposite of that. And that is, that depends on what we choose to do. Illa mashallah. So these are the six, what I call my rules. The first and foremost is to introduce Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to the child. The child must know who Allah is. And the child must have a relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. It's not just a matter of intellectually knowing somewhere, this is Allah, this is a description, no. So what? Why is that important? How does that relate to me as a human being, as a Muslim? So knowing Allah, introducing Allah is these two things. One is, who is Allah, His glory, His majesty, His power, His authority, His generosity, what He has blessed us with and so on, and answering it when we go back to Him, inshaAllah. And what is my relationship with that? Because, only when I understand my relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, then it comes to the actual action which is, therefore, what should I do? Therefore, what do I need to do? Right? It's not a, as I said before, it's not an intellectual exercise. This is a very personal relationship, which is closer and more personal than any other relationship, or the face of the earth, including our relationship with our own parents. Because all relationships of this world end with our death. The only relationship which remains is our relationship with our Creator, with our Khalif-e-Malik, with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. This remains with us even after we die. Second one is to introduce Rasulullah, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, to your child. And then you can come back to this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of ...
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  • Kuwait Parenting Workshop #2

    Kuwait Parenting Workshop #2
    Dec 4 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:I want to remind myself and you that as far as children are concerned, the only thing that parents will be questioned about before Allah is how those children were raised, about their tarbiyah. Right? You will not be asked whether your child was a doctor or an engineer or a pilot or an architect and so on. None of which are bad things to have. All good things, I am telling you. But you will not be questioned about that. You will be questioned only about the tarbiyah of the child. What is it that the child did with respect to his beliefs? And with respect to his akhlaq, his dealings? So when you are talking about what is my dream for my child, okay, that's your dream for the child. But you are not the child. At the end of the day, he is the one who is going to or she is the one who is going to have to do what you have dreamt. So where is their commitment in that? So that is very important for you to understand. Okay? So the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the commitment for the dream comes from within the child, it's not going to happen. It will not happen. So, you have to guide the child to have a kind of dream which also aligns with your own dream. If you don't do that, and it is only your dream, it won't work. And then obviously when I say you, I mean both the mother and the father. So, it has to be a three-way conversation. Sit, three of you sit together and talk about this dream. What is it that motivates you? How will you do this? And so on. So, the dream, your dream for the child really should be the child's dream for herself or himself supported by you. It's not a question, I want my child to be this or that. You may want. You may want. Won't happen. Unless you put the effort. And unless the child also wants that to happen. So, have those conversations. I don't know if you have them yet, but you should have them. Now, parenting as I say is a contact sport. It's not a armchair dialogue. You can't sit and, you know, I want this, I want that. No, it has to be your involvement. And your involvement includes your time. It includes your talent. It includes money. But much more important than money is your time. So, how much time? How much time do you give to your child? And the usual answer we get from people is, Oh, but you see, I'm very busy. I have this job. I have to travel. You're making the choices. It is your child. You have to make the choices. And if you say, I have to do all of this. That's the choice you're making. Then don't expect magic to happen because magic won't happen. Right? Right? Andre Agassi, tennis player, who had the most powerful serve of any tennis player in history. He started, literally, his father started him playing tennis, literally, when he was the highest. He was the height of an adult tennis racket. So, how old is that? Maybe two years old. He just taught us the racket. And his father designed a ball throwing machine. In those days, they didn't have these machines. Nowadays, you can buy them. But in those days, he designed a ball throwing machine which used to throw the ball at a speed of, if I'm not mistaken, about a hundred kilometers an hour. So, like a bullet. And Andre Agassi's father had this rule that he had to, again, if I'm not mistaken with the figures, he had to face one thousand serves. This ball is being fired. He has to face that serve and hit it back one thousand times a day. So, by the time Andre Agassi was like ten or twelve years old, he had already faced a million serves, which no competition, no competitor of his ever did. So, the key is the dream of the father, starting early enough, and then consistent effort on that. Not a day was missed. There was no way, as long as I was not sick in bed, I was not sick. Whether it's Christmas, whether it is this, whether it is that, it doesn't matter. You are going to fire one thousand serves in a day. And there are many such stories about, I'm giving you examples from athletics and sports because they're easy to find. Many such examples. Great sports people don't become great sports people by wishing for it. There is a lot of energy, there is a lot of effort that goes into it. And the same rule applies. So, your commitment as a parent, how committed are ...
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