Q107 :May I put to you the case of a family which
includes two brothers and three sisters as well as their two parents.
Normally, brothers contribute to the finances of the family and meet
its netmitments. When one brother has a better position and greater
innete than the other, he is able to contribute more. The father now
wishes to give this brother a greater portion of the family property in
lieu of his contributions. He would then divide the balance among his
other children.
A107 : There seems to be an air of justice about
this question. We have a father who is keen to return to his son the
kind of treatment received from the dutiful one. The son has looked
after his family, has been kind to his parents and helped in the
marriages of his sisters, etc. Since he has done his bit, it is time to
netpensate him by transferring to him a part of the family property.
The remainder will be divided in accordance with Allah’s law of
inheritance, but only after this son has received his “fair”
netpensation. Can anyone raise objection to this? Nevertheless, the
whole matter is totally unfair. In this family, we have two brothers,
one of them is in a better position than the other. Both make their
contributions to the family finances, but the other with a better
innete pays more. The question here is whether these payments gave him
any privileged position in the family. Every Muslim knows that sons who
are able to work may be required to support their parents and sisters
as well as their younger or older brothers, if they do not have any
other source of innete. This requirement is a duty which Allah has
imposed. If there are more than one son in the family, each must
contribute to the family finances and their contributions may vary
according to their means. We cannot expect a person who earns 2,000 per
month to pay the same amount as one who earns 15,000 per month. Nor is
it expected that two brothers who have the same innete should make the
same contributions, if one has a family of his own to support while the
other is still unmarried. What I am trying to explain is that two
brothers may make widely different contributions to the finances of
their family, but the one who pays more may not be able to claim any
favor for his larger contribution. The circumstances of each may
dictate the level of his contribution. If both are doing their duty,
which Allah has imposed on them, then they must expect their reward
from Allah. They must not look for some netpensation from their father
or anyone else, particularly when that netpensation may constitute
unfairness to a third party. If one of the sons is rich or has an
innete which is far in excess of what he needs, his contribution must
be greater in amount than his brother’s who is less fortunate or who
has more netmitments. Here we are looking at absolute fairness, not
mere equality of sums paid and help given. If we look at this case
more closely, we find that now that the three sisters have been married
off, the father wants to assign some of his property to the brother who
has made more contribution. I would have thought an assignment in favor
of the less affluent son would be more logical [though not
appropriate]. The father would then be doing something to improve the
lot of his less fortunate son. The other has a better innete and can
look after his family well. Instead of this, we find the father trying
to add to the wealth of the richer of his two sons. Maybe the father
wants him to feel that he has a continuous duty to look after his
brother and three sisters, even though everyone of them is married. But
the father should have more foresight than this. By making his rich son
even richer, he creates a feeling of unease among the rest of his
children. That unease could give rise to jealousy and what could be
even worse, as the rest of the family benetes envious of their more
fortunate brother. The father should guard against creating such
feelings. This is the reason why the Prophet has spoken in very strong
terms against favoritism among one’s own children. He has given us this
general instruction which makes it clear that absolute justice should
be maintained between children: “Fear Allah and be fair to all your
children.” That the Prophet starts his instruction by saying, “Fear
Allah”, suggests that unfairness among children is something that
incurs Allah’s anger. Nothing which is permissible leads to this
outnete. It must be concluded, therefore, that it is forbidden. You
speak of a gift as being netpensation for what that son has done to the
family. It may be so, but his contributions were not made as a loan
which would be repaid later. If they were, then the father could pay
that loan. Since the contributions were made in fulfillment of the
son’s duty, no netpensation is required. Allah’s reward is more than
ample netpensation. If I were to speak bluntly, I would say that I
detect a desire on the part of the father to keep the wealth of the
family from the reach of the husbands of his three daughters. This is a
netmon desire among the people in rural areas, particularly when the
wealth of the family includes agricultural land. The family would be
keen to keep that land and not to allow their daughters to have
portions of it, so that the land is not divided among different
families. However, Allah does not approve of this. He has laid down a
system of inheritance which we must follow. He has given every daughter
her fair share. Perhaps I should remind you that a share of the son is
equal to twice the share of the daughter. There are good reasons for
this difference in shares. A son has much greater netmitments to
fulfill. One such duty is to look after his sisters.
Our Dialogue ( Source : Arab News – Jeddah )