Home
Discover Islam
Quran Recitations
Lectures
Fatwa
Articles
Fiqh
E-Books
Women
Boys & Girls 
Enter Question
View By Subject
Fatwa Of The Week
Selected Fatwa
Fatwa CenterResponsibilities of children towards their mother when she gets older
Question
Can you make special provisions for someone specific? If I was married i would want to be ensured that i was cared for. So in Islam would the husband be allowed to make a provision like that? Or is that part of the marriage contract? I mean if A WOMAN marries a man with 20 children and they are all grown and have careers and spouses and babies and counsins etc, yet she is the elderly granny, how would she ensure that she will be taken care of?
Answer
All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad 
is His slave and Messenger.
Your question is unclear and ambiguous, so we will answer it according to the probability which it implies and on which the example which you gave is based, i.e. that the parents should guarantee that their children would take care of them when they need so. Indeed, Islam gave this right to the parents and obligated the children to be kind and dutiful to them especially when they become weak and needy as it is the case when they become elderly. Allaah Says (what means): {And your Lord has decreed that you not worship except Him, and to parents, good treatment. Whether one or both of them reach old age [while] with you, say not to them [so much as], “uff,” and do not repel them but speak to them a noble word. And lower to them the wing of humility out of mercy and say, “My Lord, have mercy upon them as they brought me up [when I was] small.”}[Quran 17:23-24]
Therefore, if either parent is in need for someone to spend on him/her, then this becomes an obligation on his/her sons and daughters alike if they are well-off as stated by the jurists 
.
Similarly, if they need care, then their children are obligated to take care of them and it is not permissible for the children to expose the parents to harm. For more benefit, please refer to Fataawa 133898 and 85715.
Nevertheless, stating such a matter in the marriage contract would not be of any use because the conditions that are written in the marriage contract are only related to the responsibilities of both spouses towards each other. For more benefit, please refer to Fataawa 131714 and 91448.
Allaah Knows best.
Search Fatwa
Fatwa Subject
