Of Simple Weddings and Sad Trees

When I went back to Penang for Raya this time, I attended a wedding of a cousin of a cousin in Balik Pulau. Balik Pulau is a quaint town with a lot of greenery. The wedding was held in one of the kampong houses by the roadside. There were three canopies for the guests and in the verandah of the house, there was table very simply decorated for the newly-weds and their closest relatives. It was nice to see such simplicity in a time when most people like to have very grand weddings, sometimes to compete with one another, as to who has the most grandiose wedding of them all. Often youngsters follow blindly and rather stupidly too, the wedding style and theme of celebrities which usually cost a fortune. Celebrities can do it because they are rich, but we are not and so should refrain from hosting grand weddings at the expense of our financial stability. How many times have we heard of couples who have ‘meletop’ weddings and then get into so much of debt which then destabilises their marriage, not uncommonly resulting in divorce. Wedding feasts are meant as a celebration for new couples and their families, as well as a form of worship to show gratitude to Allah for allowing the union of two beings in love in a sacred bond of marriage. And that is why it is very recommended to invite poor people to attend the feast. The prophet said, “The worst food is that of a wedding banquet (walima) to which only the rich are invited whilst the poor are not invited. And he who refuses an invitation (to a banquet) disobeys Allah and His Messenger (Allah bless him & give him peace).” (Sahih al-Bukhari, no. 4882)

Overly lavish wedding feasts are wasteful and hateful in the sight of Allah. We should strive to have moderate feasts so we may gain His blessings. It’s ok to have a grand wedding if it is within our means, but it shouldn’t be so lavish as to be detestable , and certainly shouldn’t be done at all if it is beyond our means which can lead to unnecessary debt!

Now back to the wedding I attended. At different corners of the canopies were baskets filled with rambutans from the rambutan trees within the compound of the house, for the guests to take as and when they like. All the kampong houses in the vicinity had rambutan trees in their compounds, and so abundant were the rambutans, the red colour of the fruit eclipsed the green of the leaves! The compound of the wedding house also had others fruit trees like guava, duku (from whose branches I managed to pluck some duku and eat them on the spot), mangosteen, and others. I was very thrilled at the experience of being able to pluck duku fruits directly from the tree and eat them, as it is not a very common fruit tree. I have a rambutan tree in my own house and managed to pluck so many rambutans a few weeks ago. Plucking duku though was something completely new to me, hence the excitement. I was actually confused as to the difference between duku, langsat, and duku langsat, but an uncle at the house explained the difference and showed me a bunch of ripe duku deep within the branches which I excitedly picked off and ate.

Duku tree with basket of rambutans in the shade

so many rambutans!

yellow rambutan tree across the road.... enlarge for better view

The fruits though were not always abundant as they are this year. For more than 20 years, the fruit trees hardly bore any fruits and an auntie living in the house attributed this phenomenon to the death of her mother who used to take very good care of the trees. When she was alive, they would bear lots of fruits, but upon her death, they beared very little fruit, if any until this year, when suddenly they started bringing forth lots of fruit. I suppose the trees mourned for the lady who took care of them by not bearing fruit, and such a long mourning period too. There had been no weddings at the house since the old lady died, until now. This was her grandson’s wedding, and perhaps the trees came out of their mourning to celebrate a new beginning in the house, bearing an abundance of fruits.

As a write this, I can already imagine some people shaking their heads while they read this post, thinking that I have clearly lost the plot! But I believe that living creatures other than humans do mourn for the dead. It is probably quite obvious in animals, but trees mourn too. There is a hadith reported by Anas ibn Malik that Allah’s Messenger (SAW) used to deliver his sermons reclining on the trunk of a palm tree. The sahabah (RA) then made a pulpit for him and he delivered a sermon from it, but the trunk wept like the weeping of a she-camel. So, he descended and stroked it and it ceased to weep (Tirmidhi, graded as sahih by Albani). So let us care for nature sincerely (trees included in case it isn’t obvious enough!), as it is a duty Allah has entrusted us with. Not only will we be rewarded by Allah for it, nature too will make dua’ for us, insya Allah.

The Night of a Thousand Months, NOT a thousand kuihs!

We have now come to the last ten nights of Ramadan, alhamdulillah. The Porphet SAW asked us to seek Lailatul Qadr in the odd nights of the last 10 nights. There is a whole surah in the Quran about this night (surah al-qadr):



(1. Verily, We have sent it down in the Night of Al-Qadr.) (2. And what will make you know what the Night of Al-Qadr is) (3. The Night of Al-Qadr is better than a thousand months.) (4. Therein descend the angels and the Ruh by their Lord's permission with every matter.) (5. There is peace until the appearance of dawn.) al-Qadr verses 1-5

Let us first explore what Lailatul Qadr means. Lailah means night in arabic. Al-qadr has a few meanings. We will discuss three of them here. Firstly, it can mean power like it is used in the oft heard phrase in the Quran 'Innallaha 'ala kulli syai-in Qadeer' i.e. Allah has Power of all things; it also has meanings pertaining to restriction and narrowness (this is the word Allah often uses when he speaks about restricting the provision of his slaves); and finally it can mean the Decree of Allah.

It is perhaps obvious why it would be called the Night of Power. It is better than a thousand months, and in it all the angels along with the Archangel Jibreel descend to earth with the permission of Allah. Jibreel's primary role is to bring down revelation from the heavens to the prophets. After the death of the Prophet SAW, there is actually no reason for the powerful and mighty chief of the angels to come down.  So him coming down every year on the night of Power along with the other angels is a big thing indeed. Perhaps too, the night is a demonstration of Allah's power and ability to do anything as He wishes. It is the night of abundant blessings, a night of forgiveness and there is no one who can question His will to bless the creation with such a night out of His infinite kindness.

How then is restrictiveness associated with this night? Some scholars have said that so many angels descend on that night that there is hardly any space for them to stand on earth. Their sheer numbers restricts the space on earth, hence the night of restriction. If such is the abundance of angels, then what of the blessings of the night, for where there are angels, there are blessings!

And finally, it is also called the night of decree because during this night, the Decree for all matters of the coming year are brought down. He says in surah Ad-Dukkhan:

﴿فِيهَا يُفْرَقُ كُلُّ أَمْرٍ حَكِيمٍ ﴾

(Therein is decreed every matter of decree.) (44:4)
And so it is imperative to make lots of dua' asking Allah to decree what is best for us in the coming year, and that He facilitates our affairs in the right direction.

The most important dua' of the night though is the dua' the prophet taught his wife 'Aisyah. Imam Ahmad recorded from `A'ishah, that she said, "O Messenger of Allah! If I find the Night of Al-Qadr what should I say'' He replied,

«قُولِي: اللْهُمَّ إِنَّكَ عَفُوٌّ تُحِبُّ الْعَفْوَ فَاعْفُ عَنِّي»

(Say: "O Allah! Verily, You are the Of the Pardoning, You love to pardon, so pardon me.'') Collected by Tirmidhi,Ibn Majah, An-nasa'i. Some scholars point out that 'afuww is slightly different from maghfirah (which is also forgiveness) in that 'afuww is forgiveness without having to go through the hisab/reckoning, whereas maghfirah is forgiveness after having to go through hisab in front of Allah, which is actually a very very terrifying experience given the fact that one knows while undergoing the hisab that at the end, one's place is either in Jannah or the Fire. Hence 'afuww is of a higher and better form of forgiveness, and that is why we should memorize the dua' and say it many times in the last 10 nights. Also, 'afuww connotates something in excess according to the verse in surah al-baqarah:


And they ask you what they ought to spend. Say: "That which is (spare) beyond your needs.'' al-Baqarah verse 219

So this dua' is not only about asking for forgiveness, but also about asking Allah to bless us with more than whatever we ask of Him, to give us an excess of blessings. Subhanallah! What a powerful dua'.


With such a fantastic bonus and barakah filled night for our benefit, which Allah has gifted to us out of His infinte Mercy, what a waste it is then if we do not seek it, spending the last 10 nights in prayer and other forms of worship. What a waste if instead of worship, we spend the night sleeping all the way to fajr, or going to Mydin and Kamdar for shopping (which is why some ustazs here often light heartedly remind us that the night is called lailatul qadr , NOT lailatulkamdar ), or making all sorts of kuih for personal or business purposes. Such a waste, it is almost sinful. Nay, it is indeed sinful, for the Prophet said ameen to the prayer of Jibril that those who are not forgiven after Ramadan has passed(i.e. they did not bother to take the opportunity to make use of this blessed month, especially the blessing of the night of Power), then such a person is doomed to enter the fire and is far from the mercy of Allah. Wal'iyazuillah.

If we remain heedless to such a grand blessing from Ar-Rahmaan, then I doubt there is anything in this world that can make us care about the fate of our souls in the Hereafter. What then is the end of such nonchalance and heedlessness, if not the Fire of Jahannam.

May Allah make us of those who appreciate His blessings and may He make us of those who take the opportunity to earn His pleasure and reward in this blessed month, especially on the Night of Power, Lailatul Qadr.