Why Should We Respect Our Parents: Exploring Islamic Arguments

What islam says about why should we respect our parents? In this essay I want to emphasize that Allah is telling us to treat our parents kindly and to make effort in pleasing them. He says that our mother most deserves our respect and service, because she carried us in her womb in a condition that she suffered. After she give birth to us, she still had to suckle us. The must emphatic instruction to man concerning his parents is to show gratitude and respect to them, after showing it to Allah first. He also instructs us not to neglect this command because we be returning to him in the Akhirah where we will be taken for task for our disobedience towards him and our parents.

Islamic Explanation on Why Should We Respect Our Parent

Respecting parents is one of the most significant aspect of islam. But sadly, many parents are not being treated in the correct manner they are supposed to be treated. In today’s society, some of our teenagers are fighting with their parents, young people ignore them and giving preference to their friends and to be online. As we get older, we forgot that our parents are getting older too, and they are being pushed aside to live alone, sometimes you see people taking their parents to live in the palms, when they reach a certain age where they need our tendering. We just put them there, pay some money and visit once in a while. This is totally disregarding our parents; we fail in giving them our time and attention when they need it the mostmost. Just as how we were a baby growing up, our parents tends to us with such care and love, just to ensure that we are well taken care of, the sacrifice a lot for us, they give us everything that we wanted, then why when we group up and get a life of our own, we feel that we are too busy to not give our time to our parents?

Just remember that no matter what we do for our parents we will never be able to repay them for all that they have done for us. It was mention once in a story that a man went for hajj with his elderly mother on his back the prophet (S.A.W) told him that this did not even repay his mother for a single thing which she was bearing him in her womb. This show the status our mother has in regards to treatment and respect. This does not mean that our father does not deserve our respect.

What Does the Quran Says About Respect to Our Parents?

The story of prophet Abraha in the Quran tell us that when his father was ready to kill him for destroying their idols and abandoning the pagan religion. Abraham instead of losing control, he prayed to Allah to have mercy upon him and to help him find the truth. Many children today shout at their fathers or ignore them when they are been given stren lectures or advices, from our pass prophet Abraham we learn that this is never accepted no matter the situation.

The sahabah inquired from the Nabi what are the right due to parents, he said, they are your Jannah and Jahannam, i.e. their pleasure leads you to Jannah, while their displeasure leads you to Jahannam. And some of the ways how we should gain the pleasure of our parent.

• Here are some ways of displeasing our parents without realising:
• When they advise us, we don’t listen and when they try to help us, we think they don’t understand
• Not obeying them or their guidelines for e.g. They are advising you to dress in a modest way but you still want to dress immodest to fit in with your friends.
• We don’t treat them with respect such as we ill treat them by hitting, yelling, doing things that would make them angry.

As children we should value our parents just as it was mention to us in the Quran and Hadith. We should not take our parents for granted thinking there is a tomorrow to make up for yesterday’s mistake. When we make a mistake say sorry and show how much you appreciate them. Even if your parents is a non-believer you should always be humble towards them. Don’t be wrong and strong and raise your voice above them. Children thinks its okay to address their parents by their names but its highly disrespectful you aren’t their parents but they are yours. Disrespecting our parent isn’t a small act it is considered a great punishment by Allah. Why! Because be command us to do so. There is only one situation where you disobeying your parent is if they try to get you to leave Islam or to worship another god. We should always keep one thing in mind that we will always be in debts to our parents because we can never repay them for the favours, they did for us.

However, we are commanded one way by Allah when we should not obey our parents, in chapter 31:15 ”if they for you ascribe such partners to me, about which you have no knowledge, then do not obey them” while we are commanded to obey our parents we are also commanded not to obey them when they commands us to anything that goes sharia, but this is no excuse to illtreat them, or disrespect them or to sever relationships with them

Conclusion

To sum up: why we should respect our parents? As was stated earlier in the essay, Allah gives us the ability to understand our parents and to always show respect towards them no matter the situation, create a positive thought about then, express gratitude towards them, obey their rules etc. Don’t be rude or disrespectful towards your parent. We should treat our parents with honour by showing them how important they are with kindness and having patients. And not gaining the pleasure of your parent leads to a great loss so much that it would lead you to Jahannam.