Young man, fear Allah and behave nicely with your father

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One day an old man came with his son to His Eminence (S) and said: O Allah’s Messenger, I brought up my son and loved him very much and supported him with money etc.

Now he has become rich, while I have exhausted my money and strength for him; and because of old age, I have become very weak as you can see. But he doesn’t pay any attention to me and refuses to give me food to at least keep me alive. His Eminence (S) asked that youth what reply he had. He said: Allah’s Messenger, I don’t have more than what is needed for my wife and children.

His Eminence (S) asked his father: What do you say, O Shaykh? The old man said: Allah’s Messenger, he is in possession of large quantities of wheat, barley, dates and figs and (also) dirham and dinar etc. He is very rich. His Eminence (S) asked that boy to explain. He said: Sir, I have nothing at all. His Eminence (S) said: Young man, fear Allah and behave nicely with your father. Allah will bless you.

He said: I don’t have anything. His Eminence (S) said: All right, this month I will give on your behalf but after that you provide him. Then the Prophet told Usamah to give a hundred dirhams to this old man for a month’s expense for his dependants and himself. When the next month started, the old man again came with his son and the son said: I don’t have anything.

His Eminence (S) said: You have much wealth at present but by nightfall you will be poorer than your father and nothing will be left. The young man went away from there. Suddenly people who lived near his storehouse came and said: Take away all your grains from there and keep it somewhere else, because it smells badly. He went there and saw that his wheat, barley, dates and figs have all become rotten, dirty and smelly.

They forced him to remove all that, so he employed laborers to carry away everything out of the town. Then he came back to his house along with the laborers to pay their wages from the cash at home, but all of it had turned into stones. The laborers forced him to pay and he had to sell his clothes and household things to raise money for them and at last came out with empty hands.

He became very helpless, not even having a day’s rations. The shock also made him sick. Then His Eminence (S) said: O those who are disobedient to their parents, take a lesson from this and beware that as just as properties and riches are destroyed in the world, in the same way the ranks prepared for him in Paradise shall also be replaced by pits of Hell.

Reference:Hayat Al-Qulub Vol. 2