Authority Relationships

When we consider the variety of human relationships we could pigeonhole most into just a few: Employer-Employee, Colleague- Colleague, Oneself- Imam/ Teacher, Oneself- Qadi (Judge), Husband-Wife, Parent- Child. You can always leave your job, scrub your colleague's back in the hope that they will scrub your back too when you need it most, choose to listen to your Imam and Qadi's advice, or not as the case may be. Indeed Our Messenger (saw) taught us that when you ask a Qadi for a religious verdict in a matter, that you can and should choose to ignore it if it causes a disquiet within your soul. In all of these authority relationships it is the Parent- Child one that is the most powerful. That in the body of our knowledge is governed by mutual rights: the Parent has the right to be treated with kindness, and the child has the right to a good name. The right to a good name, must not just be thought of within the sole aegis of the first naming of the child, but is an ongoing right. That the parent must not bring their own self respect into question, or into doubt. That they behave morally within wider society, in a way that does not bring shame upon the child whilst they have yet to grow into themselves in their own right. And even within that most fundamental of powerful authority relationships lie seeds that must grow to the fullness of their expression. And once again it is our body of knowledge that talks of the fullness of that expression... "Play with them for the first seven years, instruct them for the next seven years, and then treat them as your friends ever after that." That authority relationships are not our way, and is not the way of the true religion. That they are there as a temporary preface to something much much better. That we allow everyone the space to grow into their understanding of this beautiful religion, in their our time and at their own pace. That the Imam's job after gathering us for prayer, is to instruct us in the most beautiful of ways with wisdom and intelligence. Which are not through appeals to authority, which are not by proving their qualification, but proving that they understand and can cause us to understand too.

 How they fail, when they shore up their authority thinking that they thereby instruct us. For they do not dare to ponder the fullness of a child's growth into manhood, or womanhood, as a means of reflecting on the progression that they should be aiming for. The we as a Nation are meant to stand as a Nation of Men and Women, each willingly shouldering our own burden to behave in a moral manner. How they fail when they deliver a sermon without a moral message, and sometimes without even a cogent message... wandering on, providing true information without a drawing to close a conclusion. How they fail when they do not lay hints, as a means of allowing us each to grow, but in stead stunt our abilities and our hearts. For whilst we each carry an individual moral responsibility that cannot be shared. Each our individual responsibility ends not with ourselves, but with the impact we each have on our society. And the fundamental unit of Muslim Society is unique in it's own right: the Husband- Wife partnership, and what breaks it breaks our society, and what cements it, cements our society. Here expertise lies in variant hands, and authority is by mutual consent. Knowledge is through study and contemplation.
Wisdom through action.
Not lectures and talks, nor this above. Currently my phone is broken.. posted on desktop... ;-)