هذَا هوَ حُسْنُ الخلُق
This is what Good Manners mean
Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the worlds, Who does not resemble the creation. To Him belong the endowments and the befitting perfections and commendations. I ask Allah to raise the rank of Prophet Muhammad, sallallahu ^alayhi wa sallam, and to protect his nation from that which he fears for them.
الحمد لله ربّ العالمينَ لهُ النّعمَةُ ولهُ الفَضل ولهُ الثّناءُ الحسَن صَلواتُ الله البرِّ الرَّحيم والملائكةِ المقرّبينَ على سيّدنا محمَّدٍ أشرَف المرسلين وعلى جميع إخوانِه مِنَ النّبيّين آدمَ ونُوحٍ وإبراهيم وموسى وعيسى ومَن بَينَهُم وسَلامُ اللهِ علَيهِم أجمعين أمّا بعدُ
فإنّ رسولَ الله صلَّى الله عليه وسلم قال: “*أَحْسَنُ الحَدِيْثِ كِتَابُ الله وخَيْرُ الهَدْي هَدْيُ محمَّد صلَّى الله عليه وسلم*”رواه البخاري
The best of speeches is the kalam-speech of Allah, The Glorious Quran. And the best of biographies is the lifestyle of prophet Muhammad, the guidance provided by Muhammad. Allah the exalted granted him a higher status than the rest of the prophets and made the rules revealed to him the easiest of the rules. The older rules encountered difficulties that are not present in the rules revealed to Muhammad.
The manners of the messenger of Allah were applying the manners ordered in Quran just as lady ^A’ishah said as narrated by Ahmad and al-Bukhariyy in his book al-Adab al-Mufrad and at-Tabaraniyy:
“*كانَ خُلُقَهُ القرآن*رواه أحمد والبخاري في الأدب والطبراني”
Which means his manners were the Quran, that is applying the manners ordered in the Quran.
The Quran ordered with forgiveness and charity and tolerating the harm of others and with holding oneself from harming others; this is the good manners. Good manners is not only meeting others with a happy face rather it is a grand matter, it constitutes doing good with others that is those who reciprocate the goodness and those who do not and those who appreciate it and those who do not. It does not mean to appease the people with all that they do, rather it means one does not fall short in doing goodness for them. One does the goodness one is able to and does not restrict it to those who reciprocate with goodness, rather one does goodness to both those who reciprocate and those who do not.
Moreover, one holds oneself from harming others, one does not harm the people, one does not do them injustice. Sometimes one desires to publicly revenge from someone; the well mannered person stops oneself from harming the people. That is one forgives those who do one injustice. Some people, out of their ignorance and ill hearts, mistreat their parents because the parents did not pay attention to them and have mercy upon them when they were young; they conclude that they want to reciprocate mistreatment with mistreatment. They say our father was merciless and treated us harshly when we were young, now that he is in need of us we are going to reciprocate and treat him harshly and not be kind to him. Some do to their mothers the same and want to reciprocate with the same negligence and ill treatment that the mother did to them when they were young; this is contrary to the orders of Quran. Allah ordered with good manners..
Allah the exalted ordered us to exercise good manners and treat others and relatives with kindness and offer them good favors whether or not they reciprocate. One who wants to be well mannered would not sever his kins on grounds that they do not visit him and do not ask about him, rather one would visit them and be kind to them and help them out when in need. Whether ones kins are good or evil one treats them with goodness. This is how the prophets did they treated people with goodness whether or not they reciprocated. Prophet Yusuf treated his brothers kindly irrespective of that they did a lot of menace against him.He did not cuss them or harm them in retaliation for the great injustice they did to him, rather he calmed them and told them they need not worry and that he will not mistreat them. This is good manners when one controls oneself and does not harm others especially when one has the ability and status to inflict harm to those who did him injustice, but instead one tolerates and is patient with the harm others inflict on one. This is a very hard matter to apply. Very few people have such attributes. Although few still there are in the nation of prophet Muhammad people with such fine qualities of good manners.^A’ishah told a person who was inquiring about the behavior of the prophet “do you read the Quran”, he said yes, she said “the manners of the prophet were applying the orders stated in the Quran”.
^A’ishah was the most religiously knowledgeable woman ever, but there were women who were more worshipping than her such as Maryam, may Allah accept both of their deeds.^A’ishah only lived with the prophet for 9 years during which she learned the matters of the religion and excelled at it to become the most religiously knowledgeable woman ever.