Most venerable: Mother, mother, mother and father... -The Asian Age

All living being in this world including humans are created by Allah through procreation process by parents. Offspring bear the genetic codes from parents and see the light of the world on a specific time by the wish of Allah. Genetic codes inherited from parents play a dominant role in shaping the size, color, habit, character, intelligence and many other features of the offspring who transfer the same to his posterity and generation after generation. Humans wish to live in this world for eternal time by procreation process. This is how all living beings including human have been living in this world. Parents are the essential procreators through which generations flourish in this world by divine order.

In one occasion, a man had approached Prophet Muhammad (Pbuh) with a query as to who the most venerable to children in this world is. Prophet (Pbuh) had replied that mother is the most venerable. The man had further asked who is next after mother. The Prophet (Pbuh) further said, mother. This way the man asked three times and the Prophet (Pbuh) gave the same answer that mother is the most revered to posterity. When the man asked for fourth time, the Nabijee (Pbuh) said that it is father, which means father ranks fourth in comparison with the rank of mother who is most prized and venerable to the prosperity.

The Prophet (Pbuh) of Islam further said that the heaven of posterity lies under the feet of the mother. This, of course, does not undermine the position of father to the posterity. If not equal with mother, father who out of shedding his sweat and toil make his children grow up under his blessed shadow is always most venerable to the posterity without any doubt.

A man named Hazrat Owais  Quruni (RA) living in a distant area in the village of Qaran, Yemen, having never seen Prophet (Pbuh) physically became an ardent lover of the Prophet (Pbuh). Hazrat Owaise Quruni's love and veneration for the Prophet (Pbuh) was so intense that in one occasion when he came to know that one of the teeth of the Prophet (Pbuh) was martyred in the battle of Ohud, Hazrat Quruni (RA) out of his profound grief and shock and with great love for Nabijee (Pbuh) broke all of his teeth one after another by stoning with his own hand till none was left, as he did not know exactly how many or which ones were lost by the Prophet (Pbuh).

He had an ailing old mother whom he used to carry always on his back. In spite of his great longing to see the Prophet (Pbuh) physically after traveling a long distance, his long cherished desire remained unfulfilled. Turning to take a desperate move to travel and to see the Prophet (Pbuh), Hazrat Quruni (RA), by a messenger, sought permission to see the Prophet (Pbuh) after leaving his mother in safety at his village in Yemen.

Having learned Hazrat Quruni's desperate move to travel such a long distance leaving his ailing mother at home, the Prophet (Pbuh) gave a return message to Hazrat Quruni not to come and instead to remain engaged in taking care of his ailing old mother. The Prophet (Pbuh), further said in his message that taking care of ailing mother is more important than seeing the Prophet (Pbuh). The Nabijee's (Pbuh) such message reflects a clear picture that a mother doesn't have any parallel.

Hazrat Owais Quruni's (RA) unfettered love and veneration for the Prophet Mohammad (Pbuh), in spite of the fact that he had never seen Nabijee (Pbuh) physically, stood the test of time. It is known that for his unalloyed love and veneration for Nabijee (Pbuh) Hazrat Owais Quruni (RA), as per the unanimous decision of the disciples of Prophet (Pbuh) was chosen to inherit the Holy Jobba (robe) of the Prophet (Pbuh) after the demise of the Holy Prophet (Pbuh). Hazrat Quruni (RA) always left praying to Allah in the deserts after attending his mother. He received spiritual training directly from the Holy Prophet.

With a non-phenomenal object named Soul infused to human body by Allah, nature of which still lies encrypted beyond the jurisdiction of scientific observation and experiment, posterity is endowed with a separate and independent entity and that really makes them different to some extent from their parents in ideas, thoughts, outlooks and attitude toward defining the values of life. 

Sometime it appears shocking and devastating to some seemingly gullible (!) parents who, out of their frenzy of great love and affection, think that their posterity are their second selves and exclusively belong to them and remain under their shadow for the rest of life. Sadly, these parents, at the end of the day fall in a reverse situation depicting a widened gap in ideas, thoughts and attitude between them and their offspring brewed over the passage of time.

Religious texts emphasize that posterity is not the property of procreator Allah is the creator and proprietor of all living being including human posterity who exist by their own entity and live in freedom by their own way of life. But some parents whose hearts are exuberantly filled with a sea of nectar of love and affection with high emotional value beyond explanation, do not like to accept that cruel fact of life and venture to cross the border line of expectation by treating the progeny as their property. They tend to hold their offspring in the warmth of their chest even if they are grown up, the way birds hold their young chicks under the warmth of their feather.

Alas! like chicks of birds, some humans posterity tend to break the shackles of heavenly bonding of love and affection of their parents at certain twist and turns of life for quenching their never ending thirst of gliding in cherubic celebration in the endless joyful firmament of life. This heavenly gesture of parents sometime does not gain due recognition from some unfortunate posterity who subconsciously treat their old parents a hated burden of life. Some disgruntled posterity with stone heart even go to the extent of driving out their old parents from their home and in some special cases of pseudo compassion push them to 'old home' at the far end of life. Having been ignored with abominable pity and bearing a paranoid anxiety for the rest of life, snubbed parents then draw a conclusion that their own blood has betrayed with them in defiance of all tender values of life.

Behavior pattern of the circulation system of blood in human anatomy is more or less homogeneous to the system of anthropoid-apes and as such that impact is clearly reflected in both the species with a very negligible difference. Issue of parents being neglected or defied by posterity is no doubt much shocking and pitiful aspects of human life beyond measure if the problem is purely viewed in humane consideration.

But since the human character and psyche is naturally designed with a mould blended in both barbarism and rationality, expectation of absolute and utopian rationality in human behavior is perhaps an object of distant cries. Despite mother Earth is the only known sweet home in the Universe where humans rule supreme with wonders of all scientific splendors, humanity is often trampled at the cross-road under the jackboot of barbarism and irrationality wherein unfortunately some parents fall victim which they do not deserve at all.  

Parents' misery and distress caused by utter disobedience of posterity is tantamount to betrayal of one's own blood and that often makes this world pitiful and unworthy of living in spite of the fact that surfacing from dark cave as cavemen, not too long time ago, into the light of the world; humans are now at the climax of civilization to build a fantasy world with acquired scientific and technological wisdom.

At this point, before I conclude, I wish to borrow a few invaluable words from great philosopher Bertrand Russell who wrote in the prologue of his autobiography: "Three passions, simple but overwhelming strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair. .....Love and knowledge so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens but always pity brought me back to earth.

Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people a hated burden to their sons and the whole world of loneliness, poverty and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer. This has been my life. I have found it worth living and would gladly live it again if chance were offered to me."

With the above inspiring words of the great philosopher, we too all long to live in this beautiful world with our posterity and fellow human beings in lasting peace, prosperity and happiness. Wayward and derailed sons of the parents must comprehend and realize by their hearts that it is the parents who have shown them the light of this beautiful world by procreation under divine order. They can find their heaven nowhere else but under the feet of their mother only. Let every day be a Parents Day.

 The writer is a former civil servant