bismillaah

rose

Monday, January 22nd of 2007, my husband’s step father passed away. It was an unexpected and sudden death. We got the call around 11:30 A.M, while we slept. I remember I had the phone and kept turning it off because I was dead tired. Suddenly though, our answering machine went off and it was my mother in law screaming and telling my husband to call his brother’s cell. My husband woke up to it immediately and he called his brother and we got the news that he was in the hospital.

We rushed down south as soon as we could but what we didn’t know was that he had been dead within a minute or two of his massive heart attack. As we drove what usually takes us an hour… we got a call and it was from my husband’s sister in law (no one else could speak) and she then told us he was already dead. It was a very quiet drive.

His step-father died a kaafir on the dhaahir and that made it even more painful for my husband and I. We are aware of the reality of the Hereafter for those who die having not accepted La ilaha illa Allaah. I must say though that the man on many occasions accepted that God was One and that `Eesa (`alayhis salam) was just a man. Allaah is The Just.

It hurt to hear our son tell us, “Papa’s boats”… as we passed a boat store. My son was my husband’s step dad’s most beloved. I don’t know what it was about Layth, but he loved him so much. He taught him how to fish at 2 and taught him to like hunting by 3. He took him fishing on his boat and always tried to spoil him lol.

Sometimes I gave Layth time-outs and Papa would always try to get me to be ‘nicer’. I would get mad because then Layth thought he had a way out but that’s just how much he loved him. He may not have been his blood but if you weren’t from the family, you would have thought he was.

He also helped me and my husband out so much and had so much respect for our Deen. Even more then my mother in law had. The weekend before his death, they came over because they bought Layth this really beautiful bed masha’Allaah and they helped us organize his room. (See, my mother in law is a clean freak and she made Papa the same way lol and that’s why they came… kind of like ‘to the rescue’.) We took them out to eat at Olive Garden as a thank you and it was just something we were thankful to them for. He worked so much and slept little and still found time to help out so many people, especially us (but probably because he loved our son so much).

Anyways… it was a very hard week. For me, it was the first close to home death I had experienced. It was the first dead body that I saw in front of me and the first time I had experienced the preparation for the funeral/burial. I haven’t even attended a Muslim one, seriously. But it was sooo hard to see all of the stuff before the funeral/burial (which I did not attend). My mil didn’t want to do most of it but did it to please his family. He would have hated it. Should I mention that he had planned on writing his will in a few weeks and was going to mention that he didn’t want of this to be done? I won’t go into details about what was done just because I know he would have hated it and at the least I can do that since I can’t make du`aa’ for him.

It’s crazy what these kuffar do. Even though I’ve never attended a Janazah or washed a body… I know the way a Muslim is cleaned and how we respect the dead body and bury it asap. I am just so grateful for that because by Allaah everything they did was like self-inflicted pain and just total ignoring of the man’s dignity. All for the pleasure of the others. I call it selfishness.

The day after the burial we found out about Zuhair’s (may Allaah grant him Nur, aameen) death. My husband was blessed with the opportunity of meeting him and benefitting from his company tremendously, alhamdulillaah. I was also blessed to have taken Islaamic courses with him for the same amount of hours, in the same online room, a few days a week. We got to see how determined the brother was… even with the disease he had.

To be quite honest… his death brought about something we needed the entire week… some hope. It hurt so much to know ‘Papa’ died a kaafir and yet he was a decent man. It was very sad to see the kuffar make up stories of comfort, knowing they aren’t true. It made it so much harder and we were constantly rejecting things in our hearts. We were there for support (even though we were so weak too) and had to be very wise with anything we said.

I saw many people’s posts and spoke to a few people who are just so down about Zuhair’s death… but for my husband and I it brought a smile. A smile because the brother has relief from this dunyaa’ now and with the fact that no one had anything bad to say about him but plenty of great, we smiled even more. What is there not to smile for? He didn’t die weak. He didn’t die a kaafir. He died determined and always trying to find a way to learn and apply the knowledge he gained. He was working on a paper about Halal meat in America and he was masha’Allaah really stuck on that… masha’Allaah

I’m happy for him because Allaah is Merciful to His Believing Slaves. What a ni`ama to have Islaam… Allaah is Very Merciful to those who simply testify with certainty la ilaha illa Allaah and that is why we smiled.

May Allaah ease the pain of his family and accept him as a shaheed, aameen