Be Humble With Your Children

Muslim Reflections on Leonard Sax’s The Collapse of Parenting

Leonard Sax argues that the key to transferring your values to your children is your “parental authority”. “Authority” is a heavy word. We might think that parents earn their authority by being heavy-handed with their children. But that is not what Sax means by “parental authority”. To Sax, parents have authority when their children value them more than their peers. And they don’t achieve this by disciplining their children; they achieve it by having fun with them. Not in the way that a peer has fun with them but in the way that someone with authority has fun with them.

What does it mean for parents with authority to have fun with their children? And how is that different from the way that children’s peers might have fun with them? Leonard Sax has several useful suggestions in his book that I encourage all of you to read. But authoritative parenting has been part of Islamic culture for centuries, and I find suggestions that are grounded in Islamic culture far more inspiring and meaningful.

Shaykh Muhammad al-Hashimi al-Tilmisani

The late Algerian scholar Shaykh Muhammad al-Hashimi al-Tilmisani (d. 1961), may Allah Most High have mercy on him, was admired by his students and fellow scholars for his exemplary humility. He once heard someone remark that religious scholars need to assert their religious authority over their students. Now, that is correct—in order for religious scholars to truly inspire their students, their students need to look up to them, admire them, and emulate them. But how do they gain that authority? Shaykh Muhammad al-Hashimi explained that they gain their authority by their humility. Whenever someone who has a higher rank—like a religious scholar or a parent—comes down from their rank a little bit to the level of those who are beneath them, they gain their love, admiration, and respect. That’s how religious scholars gain authority over their students. And that’s how parents gain authority over their children.

That’s how the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) was. When he arrived in Medina with his Companion Abu Bakr, Medinans who were seeing him for the first time couldn’t tell the two of them apart. When he would sit with his Companions on the floor of his mosque, he looked like them, sat like them, talked with them, and laughed with them. If out-of-town visitors came to these gatherings for the first time, they would not be able to tell the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) apart from his Companions. As the number of out-of-town visitors grew, and they repeatedly failed to identify the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace), his Companions built a slight elevation for him to sit on so that he could be distinguished from the rest of them.

There was no one with more authority than the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace)—God Himself had sent to all of mankind! How did he gain his authority? He gained it with his humility. He taught his Companions, “Allah raises whoever humbles himself for His sake.” (Muslim) That’s how he gained his authority.

And that’s how parents gain their authority. No one ever gained authority by heavy-handedness. Heavy-handedness will drive your children away from you. Parents gain their authority by coming down from their rank a little bit to the level of their children, by talking to them at their level, by playing with them at their level, by laughing with them at their level, by having fun with them at their level. If you want to gain authority over your children, tell them a story in an animated way that makes them want to listen to you, tell them a joke that makes them laugh with you, go canoeing with them, play basketball with them.

The key is to do all of that as a parent, not as a peer. When you do that as a parent, your child understands that you have a rank over them, but that you are coming down from your rank to their level. This will make them love you, admire you, and listen to you. You will now be able to transfer your religious values to them.

But when you do all of that as a peer, your child does not understand that you have a rank over them. Quite the opposite. They will have a sense of entitlement, throw tantrums, and speak to you in a demanding way. This happens because both parents and children have succumbed to the culture of disrespect that I talked about here and here. The humility that parents show their children needs to be coupled with being in command. In a healthy family culture, the parent tells the children what to do, not the other way around. More about that in my next message, insha’Allah.

I encourage all of you to buy the book, read it, follow along as I explain, and please ask your questions here. Every week, I will select one of your questions to answer in this message.

Hamza Karamali