Reflections During Father's Day

A Chance to Reflect on Family Unity in the Islamic Tradition

Jun 9, 2009

The components of a united family in Islam are prayer, studying, recreation, and mutual consultation.

Each Father’s Day marks a good time for fathers to implement a few measures that will bring unity to the family. In today’s culture and society, unity through working together are qualities that are given little attention.

Humans are beings whose fitra (nature) is to form communities. As such the desire to bond with someone or group and form group ideologies begins at a very young age.

If no bonding takes place within the family, the husband, wife, or child will desire to bond with an external group who may not share the values of the family. At their worst, such external groups may corrupt the values of a family member and in the end, one is faced with a corrupted soul that will not resemble any of the values inherent in the family group.

What follows are some simple practices a Muslim family can integrate into their lives in order to satisfy the craving to belong, while strengthening the family unit.

Prayer as a Bonding Activity

In Islam praying together is a very important factor. Muslims around the world gather to pray five times a day. During the hours at home Muslims are encouraged to pray these five daily prayers together as a family. This creates an atmosphere of unity among husband, wife, and children as they gather together and conduct movements and meditative practices in unison.

Studying the Quran as a Family

Islam encourages studying of the Quran and other Islamic reading material within the family unit. This practice creates an atmosphere of participation among the Muslims. The children get to see the wisdom of their parents and benefit from it. While the parents get to see the light of understanding turn on within the minds of their children.

Devotion to God and respect towards parents are qualities developed through studying the Quran as a family, and the youth can simultaneously gain a greater understanding of their religion's beliefs, values and history.

Family Unity Through Recreation

In Islam, recreation is a necessary component of the cohesiveness of the family. In it a family learns its strengths and weaknesses. They learn how each other thinks and react to certain situations. They learn a degree of trust for each other. Recreation puts the fun back into the learning process, while promoting unity and teamwork.

Mutual Consultation

In Islam, a cohesive well-functioning family must adapt the practice of consulting each other on various issues. A person who thinks in a vacuum gets lost in the dirt collection bag.

A Muslim who consults his/her family is a person who is utilizing as many perspectives as possible to come to a clearly thought out viable conclusion to an issue.

In short a family that pray, play, and talk together is a family that stays together, and Father's Day is a great opportunity to implement a new routine to promote unity in the Muslim family.

The copyright of the article Reflections During Father's Day in Islamic Practices is owned by Khalil Green. Permission to republish Reflections During Father's Day in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.