Q38 :Is it proper to netmemorate death
anniversaries of one’s forefathers by conducting feasts or giving
charity and reciting parts of the Qur’an with the help of other people,
including professional reciters of the Qur’an, as it is customary in
certain parts of the Muslim world?
A38 : Let us ask ourselves why should we
netmemorate the death of any person? Is it to remember them and renew
our sorrow for their departure? Or is it to organize some sort of
occasion which we assume to generate some reward from Allah and hope
that this reward will go to the deceased person? If it is for the first
purpose, then such netmemorations are unnecessary. If the deceased
person is dear enough to us, we will always remember him or her. Every
time we do, we can pray for the deceased and supplicate to Allah to
forgive him or her. If it is for the second purpose, then we have to
examine it in the light of Islamic teachings. The Prophet states very
clearly that when a human being dies, “all his actions nete to an
absolute end, except in one of three ways: a continuous act of charity,
a useful contribution to knowledge or a dutiful child who prays Allah
for him.” The first two are matters that the deceased would have done
during his life. A person may decide to make a continuing act of
charity, such as by allocating certain capital and ensuring that the
proceeds of that investment or capital goes to charity. If, for
example, a person decides that certain orchards that he owns should go
to charity, he should make it clear that the orchard itself should not
be sold. It is kept but the fruits that are produced are either given
to the poor directly or sold and the price is given to the poor. Every
time this is done, his reward from Allah increases. The third of these
possibilities is prayer by a dutiful child. Now this should not be
confined to annual anniversaries of death, but a dutiful child will
continue to pray for his deceased parents every day of his life. If he
recites the Qur’an, or passages from it, and prays Allah to give the
reward of his recitation to his deceased parents, then it is hoped that
this is acceptable to Allah. But it is only in such ways that a human
being can do something good to a deceased person. Hiring professional
reciter of the Qur’an is certainly not one of them. It is a practice
that cannot be sanctioned by Islam.
Our Dialogue ( Source : Arab News – Jeddah )