CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER SEVEN

HUSBAND AND WIFE

Section Two

General Rules

Alongside the particular duties and conduct of husband and wife in the family, there are rules common to both of them. These rules should be studied in every family and taught to children through their teachers. If either of the two sides does not know these rules and does not follow them, the problems will never end. The very first rule is this: the husband is not the wife's property, and the wife is not the husband's. The husband is not the wife's slave, nor is the wife the husband's servant girl. Each of them will answer before God for their own deeds. Just as it is essential that the husband, driven by his ego, does not torment his wife, oppress her or humiliate her, so too the wife, relying on her own mind and ego, must not look upon her husband with contempt and disregard. Secondly, the husband is the head of the family. This is an unchanging truth in the old values and worldview of the Uzbek people. Both husband and wife are obliged to understand and accept this truth equally. They must always keep in mind that the final decision always belongs to him, and that the wife must always obey her husband in every respect. Thirdly, the purpose of the family is not to secure someone's power, but to preserve the family forever and to live purely and in peace, as human beings should. Just as the leader of any community is obeyed without question, so the head of the family is obeyed without question. Husband and wife struggle to save the family in every situation. The goal is for the family always to be strong. Fourthly, every family's problem belongs to that family alone. No one — not parents, not brothers, not teachers and mentors, not imams or sultans — can know the true cause of a family's problem. That is, husband and wife must never take their problems with each other outside. Let both of them equally guard the family's secrets and not spread their disagreements and quarrels to the world. For a secret or a problem that leaks outside has a very negative effect on the reputation of the family — of husband and wife — and that damage cannot be undone afterward. Fifthly, husband and wife must take care of each other and understand each other. In every situation let them try to refrain from hurting each other. Whether with the tongue or with the hand — let both sides make refraining from this their highest motto. “I will not beat my wife! I will not oppress her!” — “I will not oppress my husband! I will take care of him!” Sixthly, both husband and wife must understand that they did not come into life to make merry, that life is made up of hardship and comfort. Husband and wife must be patient with each other. Forgiving each other's mistakes is beautiful. “This is my husband!” — “This is my wife!” — that is enough; it suffices for bearing each other's faults gracefully and forgiving them. Seventhly, the family must have its own internal laws, and both sides are required to observe them. Let husband and wife trust each other. Let them protect each other's honor and reputation. Ninety-nine percent of those who interfere in a family's affairs from outside are destroyers of the family. If the husband speaks ill of the wife, or the wife of the husband, it makes no difference whether their words are true or false — they spread to the world; the imam may even tell the congregation at Friday prayer that a certain person said such-and-such.

Everyone enjoys gossiping about them — one group vilifies the husband, another the wife. In truth, at that very moment both groups are Satan's army — Satan is trying to destroy the family with their tongues. Though they seem to be worried for the husband or the wife, they do not rest until the family is destroyed. As if one side wants to rescue the young man from an unfit and foolish wife, and the other wants to free the woman from a tyrant of a husband. Both sides are incapable of sensing how husband and wife, deep down, yearn for each other. No man of standing comes forward and thinks of reconciling the two sides. As a result, husband and wife are left humiliated and degraded, utterly disgraced, like clowns whose backs have been exposed. Now, in whatever circle they are talked about, mud is sure to be thrown at the honor of one of them. Their own words are brought up as evidence. For poor little children there is nothing harder than hearing insulting words about their parents, yet some tactless people do not even hesitate to speak ill of the father or the mother to those very children, and by doing so they trample the child's pure heart under their heels. That is why a young man and a young woman who are getting married should take these words firmly to heart: “I will never sell my family's secrets!” “I will never sell my husband's secrets!” “I will never speak ill of my wife!” “I will never speak badly of my husband's honor!” It must be known that a person who speaks ill of husband and wife to each other is very likely Satan. For Satan there is no greater happiness than a quarrel between husband and wife and the breakup of a family. Sowing the seeds of discord and enmity between husband and wife is the work of Satan, and the people who do this are the most loathsome of people. They are not human, they are not even animals; they are simply creatures of a foul nature. It must be known that husband and wife must never praise each other anywhere. If a wife praises her husband, the thoughts of women of weak upbringing and scattered minds who hear her words become tangled; leaving their own husbands aside, they begin to see the husband of their friend, or of their older or younger sister, as perfect. Let a husband never mention his wife with praise anywhere, lest another man, leaving his own wife aside, become weak-hearted toward the wife of his friend or of his brother. He may even foolishly come to his own wife and praise someone else's wife. Both husband and wife must understand that the family is their complete happiness. The family is the most precious thing for them. The most precious of riches is kept hidden. There can hardly be a more embarrassing situation than your family being the talk of people's tongues. How beautiful it is when every person lives happily with their family in a hidden way! Let a happy person not show off his happiness to the world, lest he soon lose it. It is unthinkable for a person who has a family to be unhappy; if a man or a woman who has a family thinks they are unhappy, they are ungrateful and base, foolish and lacking discernment. A creature who has not seen a happiness like the family, a being who has not turned their family into a flower garden and a spring meadow, is surely doomed to unhappiness, perhaps to something five times worse.

Akrom MALIK