From a class on Al-Ghazali to lessons for our children

IqraSaurus is about children, but the parents in our family are students too. This page is a sample of the notes we took at a class we attended. It is headed "The Path to Allah".

We took these notes around 2010, when our two eldest were not yet in primary school.

What is on the page

The class was on Imam Al-Ghazali's Bidayatul Hidayah, written on the page as "Beginning of Guidance". At the top is a list of four things that stop us on the way to Allah: dunya, people, syaitan and nafsu. Beside syaitan we wrote "Easiest to fight". Beside nafsu, "Hardest to fight".

From there the page branches out. There are notes on dhikr and on saying Bismillah, a circle around istighfar with the words "with tears" beside it, and a box headed khusyuk with two reminders for prayer: get your wudhu right, and focus on who is in front of you. On the right is a list of books to buy next, Minhajul 'Abidin and Ihya Ulumuddin. Some notes are in English and some in Malay, the way we talk at home.

From our notes to our children

Pages like this are where we start turning a lesson for adults into something we can use with our children, in simple words. Some of it is already close. Four things that stop us is a list a child can count on one hand. Getting wudhu right and remembering who you stand in front of is something a child can try at the very next prayer.

With our children, these ideas became lessons on akhlaq, good character. In our Friday sessions with them, we talked about one or two qualities a Muslim needs.

For us this is the same spirit as the 4-I, worked through by adults. A class inspires us. We look into what the teacher said and what it asks of us. We try to bring it into our own prayer and habits. Then we pass it on, in simple words, to the people closest to us, who are usually our children.

For parents

Keep learning yourself, and keep your notes. Before you put the notebook away after a class, circle one idea you could explain to a seven-year-old. Then explain it, at dinner or on the way home. One idea, explained in a child's words, is enough for one evening.