Is Marriage Becoming A Fashion?

Assalam 'Aleikum people,

All praises are due to Allaah [swt] and may Allaah [swt] send His peace and salutations upon the Best of men, al-basheeru nadheer,

InshAllaah this is going to be a very informal post, I'm just going to share couple of thoughts that came to me this week-

1) Okay, this week I began a new 'course' by the permission of Allaah [swt] and I met new sisters from all over London and obviously I got to speak to few of them, all very lovely girls mashAllaah. Like all conversations, we asked each other's names, ages, professions and other related questions. I was responding to the questions with sympathy and there's one thing that became almost reccurent in all the conversations I've had with different sisters. The common interrogation that constantly came up to me was:

- 'Oh, so you graduated mashAllaah, you getting married?
Me: -'No, no *'  *weird face
-'Oh, but you engaged?'
Me: -'No, no*' *anxious face
-'Oh okay'

***
Can you imagine the awkwardness of this conversation? Well, obviously I was trying to cover up this awkwardness with giggling away.. noise had to be made, somehow-anyhow.

This is the first thing I wanted to talk about, there's this thing that is so commonly widespread within sisters in the UK and I believe it's a recently developed trend which consists in sisters thinking they 'must' go university, graduate, marry, have kids .. in that order. So, for my case, it's like almost everyone I know is currently awaiting some sort of 'call' announcing my big day or something. One of the sisters I had spoken to actually said to me: 'But, don't you want to get married?' now that did make me laugh!

Sisters, do not enchain yourself to marriage! That's so destructive! Some girls think that if they hit the digit 2.0 then they're on the firing line. No, by no means! Marriage, nowadays has become like peer pressure ..almost! It's fashionable, everyone is getting married and if you're not in the trend then you're left out and old.

Please, remember that marriage is not a joke. My teacher actually reminded us of a brilliant point which tends to get at the back of our heads for the most part. He said: 'Know that when you're getting married, you're not just getting married in the dunya but your husband will also -inshAllaah- be your husband and partner in Jannah.' SubhanAllaah- how many of us actually think about this when 'considering' someone?

We ask Allaah [swt] to guide us to the clear path.


2) As I mentionned above, it's fashion to get married and quite sadly, the side effect is that many many young people get into this without knowledge. Have we forgotten the title of the first chapter in Sahih Bukhari? In Sahih Muslim? Mentionned by Nawawi? They all said: 'Al 'ilm qabla al 'amal wa-l qawl' which translates into 'Knowledge before action and speech'. This is so crucial! Why don't people who are aiming to get married -in the near or far future- learn about this tremendous act of worship? It hurts me when I ask a bride-to-be: 'Hey sis, so have you read on the topic of zawaj?' and she responds: 'Erm, not really' or 'I have just read a few ahadiths' or something along those lines. :-(

Why do we have in almost every book of hadith a WHOLE chapter dedicated to the fiqh of Marriage and so many narrations on this topic if it weren't that important? Please, my advise for everyone out there: before you get married, make sure you read or study all the ahadiths on this topic and yes- about the rules of talaq too. Most sisters know very little about divorce yet who knows the ghayb? You may -may Allaah forbid- be confronted with this, so know your rights.

I have other rants to let out of my system but I shall keep them for later inshAllaah. :-)

May Allaah [swt] forgive me and you from our sins and give us sincerity in all our words and deeds.
Subhanaka Allaahuma, astaghfirullaah wa atubu ilayk.


UmmZ.