There was a lovely incident that happened during the Khilafat of Hazrat Umar (ra), may Allah be pleased with him. He was doing his usual secret rounds to see the true condition of the people and he heard a conversation of a mother and daughter.
The mother was telling her daughter that she was making very little profit selling the milk and that when she was little, they use to add some water to the milk to increase the profit. The daughter replied that, ‘at that time she was not a Muslim, but now we cannot cheat.’
The mother tried to reassure her that it was okay to add some water, but the daughter responded by saying that we must follow the Islamic injunctions. The mother retorted that neither the Khalifa nor his officers would find out, so no harm. But the daughter refused to budge and said that that might be so, but ‘how can we escape the notice of Allah and our own conscience.”
The attitude and piety of the daughter impressed Hazrat Umar (ra) greatly and he ordered a man to purchase some milk from the girl the following day to see if water had been mixed with it. When he found out that the girl had kept her resolve despite the urgings from her mother, he said “Such a girl would become a great mother. Her integrity is not weighed in coins; it is to be measured in the scale of national values. I shall offer her the highest award in my gift, and which shall also be in the highest interest of the nation.”
Hazrat Umar (ra), may Allah be pleased with him, then brought the mother and daughter to his court and turning to his own sons said, “Here is a gem of a girl, who would make a great mother. I desire that one of you should take this girl as a wife. I know no better bride than this girl of sterling character. In the matters of wedlock, it should be the character and not the statue in life, that should count.”
His third son, Asim, who was unmarried, offered to marry the girl and thus she became the daughter-in-law of the Khalifa, and from their progeny came Hazrat Umar (ra) bin Abdul Aziz who became a great Khalifa of Islam and renowned for his piety and simplicity.
It is a lovely incident which shows the importance of developing piety and good morals in our children and also look for those qualities when choosing a partner for our child.
