Foreword

A man once went to the Prophet with a grievance against his relatives. ‘O Messenger of God,’ he said, ‘I have some relatives whom I treat with kindness. Yet they show me no kindness. I treat them well and they treat me badly. I show them forbearance and they treat me with brutality.’ The Prophet replied, ‘If you are as you say you are, then it is as if you have smeared their faces with dust. And you will always have God’s help against them so long as you continue to be wellbehaved towards them.’ HADITH OF MUSLIM