I feel my daughter-in-law is lazy and disrespectful of me; what should I do?
Question: My daughter-in-law is one of the laziest people! She does not heed her responsibility as a human being let alone as a wife! Even after eating food, which others cook and serve before her hands, she leaves without even picking up the leftovers on the table or the plates she eats in. How strange this girl is! She lacks a conscience, or so I think. She sees how tired her mother-in-law is, but she does not help her. I kept silent and did not talk to my son about this matter until I became impatient. Instead of reforming herself and accepting the truth, she became angry and stopped talking to us. She has begun paying no attention to us. I wonder at these strange types of youth from this generation. What would you advise me and my daughter-in-law and those amongst your readers who are like her?
The answer: This girl and those like her are the results of bad education in the houses of their families. Bad cultures and some TV programs produce dependent and lazy people who do not feel any responsibility or any value of time and age. This is a general aspect of luxurious societies, which is not an aspect of good and faithful people.
True faith makes man active, generous, merry, loving, cordial, cooperative, and eager to do good whenever he can, and humanity makes man an attractive being with his behavior. If man loses these two elements, what value does he have then?
In Islam, we have moral incentives that make us hurry to serve people and carry out their needs.
Once, the Prophet (S) suggested to his companions to build a bridge over a river to help the weak people cross. Some companions said they would build the bridge the next day. When they came the next day, they found the bridge was already built. They went to the Prophet (S) to tell him that. The Prophet (S) asked who had built the bridge and some people replied, ‘O messenger of Allah, we went before them and built the bridge just for the reward of Allah.’
The Prophet (S) prayed to Allah for these companions for their actions and also for the other ones for their intention. Thus, faith led the believers to accomplish great achievements with which the Islamic civilization was formed. It is the civilization about which the scholars of the West and the East have said that it was the source of the modern sciences and the source of the positive aspects of the Western civilization.
This spirit that the great Prophet (S) had inspired into Muslims has died in most Muslims of nowadays. Some of them are lazy to such a degree that they are indifferent even to their personal affairs and what brings happiness to their marital life. However, this does not mean that it is not possible for that spirit to come back to them or for it to be revived in the souls again.
This is on the level of Islam, civilization, and life, but the same can also be said for individuals and their families.
As for the problem presented in the question, it can be treated through the following steps:
1. Attract this young wife by showing her more respect and encouragement so that she can undertake some responsibilities without becoming angry.
2. Give her some books that discuss concepts like cooperation, undertaking responsibilities, purposefulness, and the importance of winning the love of others in the family by performing domestic affairs.
3. Avoid forcing and scolding, whether implicitly or openly, for these things will lead her to resist.
4. Your son (her husband) should teach her the Islamic teachings concerning the moral sides, part of which is the wife’s work in the house such as cooking, cleaning, and other things; though they are not obligatory like prayers and fasting, this work nevertheless is a moral duty that has a direct influence on the happiness of the marital life. She should know that intentional cooperation increases love, which is the basis of the marital life.
As there are certain duties and responsibilities incumbent on the husband, there are certain duties and responsibilities incumbent on the wife too. Without mutual cooperation, their life will be full of troubles and then it may reach a painful end.
5. The husband should also help his wife by performing some household affairs whenever he has time and is ready, for he will be rewarded for that.
6. The household affairs can be forced onto this wife in a clever way. For example, those who usually perform the daily affairs in the house may travel and leave this wife in the house so that she would be obliged to work in the house. I hope that she will not be cleverer than you like a certain lazy wife whose husband and mother-in-law planned to involve her in the household responsibilities as follows:
The husband and his mother would compete for the broom; each of them would try to sweep so that the wife might feel shame and come take the broom from them and start sweeping herself. One day, she came to them and surprised them by saying to her husband coldly and with a soft voice: O dear, there is no need to dispute. One day you can sweep and the other day your mother can sweep.
After this witticism, I would like to recommend this dear wife and those like her of some things that have advantages and rewards for them:
1. Work has a virtuous value that raises man to a high position and makes him respected and beloved.
2. He who exerts himself becomes healthy, while the lazy ones are often sick. Work activates the circulation of blood, joints, and muscles while laziness does the opposite.
3. Willpower is a power that works miracles. It must be used in constructive ways.
4. Humbleness is a quality of those who sit on the top of the good life, so wherefore is this haughtiness, which throws man into the abyss of meanness?
5. Man must have practical experiences in his life. In life, there are many sudden events that a woman may fall into, and then she can rescue herself based on her knowledge from previous experiences.
6. In order for the difficulty of the household affairs to become easy for you and in order to get rid of your laziness, you should think of the rewards of the afterlife. The infallible Imams of the Ahlul Bayt (a.s.) have narrated, ‘When a woman gives her husband a drink of water, it is better for her than the worships of a year spent in fasting during the day and praying in the night. For every drink she gives to her husband, Allah will build her a town in Paradise and forgive her sixty sins.’