Supporting Your Husband: Advice From Islamic Teachings

Islam and Women

Support Your Husband

Umm Milad Attariyyah

Islam has given us marriage as a cornerstone of society and prescribed rights for spouses to ensure a fair and balanced relationship. The husband, for example, is tasked with taking care of his wife, providing for her, and living a good life in co-operation with her. In a similar vein, the wife is told to present herself in a good manner before her husband, pay attention to his needs, and be a source of tranquillity for him. She should not burden her husband with ongoing demands, lest she compel him to disobey Allah Almighty, as forewarned in the hadith:

There will be a time when no religious person’s religion will be safe unless he flees from mountain to mountain and cave to cave. When that time arrives, provisions will not be acquired without displeasing Allah Almighty. When that is the state of affairs, a man’s destruction will be at the hands of his wife and children…

The noble Companions رَضِیَ الـلّٰـهُ عَنْھُم asked, “How will that be, O Messenger of Allah صَلَّى الـلّٰـهُ عَلَيْهِ وَاٰلِهٖ وَسَلَّم?” He صَلَّى الـلّٰـهُ عَلَيْهِ وَاٰلِهٖ وَسَلَّم replied, “They will shame him concerning poverty. So, at that time he will expose himself to places in which he will be destroyed.”^[1]

In this hadith, alongside men, there is advice for those women who criticise their husbands in relation to their incomes such that their husbands give no attention to the lawful and the unlawful and adopt unlawful means in fulfilling their unwarranted demands, endangering their graves and hereafter. A hadith states, “There will come upon the people such a time when a person will have no concern as to where he acquired (wealth), from the lawful or the unlawful.”^[2]

Commenting on this hadith, Muftī Aḥmad Yār Khān NaꜤīmī رَحْمَةُ الـلّٰـهِ عَلَيْه adds:

People will become indifferent to Islam in the final days; they will entrap themselves in every way while trying to satisfy their stomachs.  They will be worried about increasing their income, gathering wealth and will become daring in acquiring every permissible and impermissible thing, as has become widespread in our times.^[3]

Therefore, women should be mindful of their demands and not plunge their husbands into difficulty. Instead, they should support their spouses and be a source of peace for them. Furthermore, if we look closely at the blessed life of Sayyidatunā Khadījah رَضِیَ الـلّٰـهُ عَنْهَا, we find that she assisted the beloved Prophet  صَلَّى الـلّٰـهُ عَلَيْهِ وَاٰلِهٖ وَسَلَّم through the most difficult of times in every way she could, proving herself as a loyal, sincere, well-wishing, obedient wife.

May Allah Almighty, for the sake of Sayyidatunā Khadījah رَضِیَ الـلّٰـهُ عَنْهَا, grant Muslim women the ability to follow the example set by her.

اٰمِیْن بِجَاہِ خاتَمِ النَّبِیّیْن صلَّی اللہ علیہ واٰلہٖ وسلَّم