Modesty Becomes the Young!

The preface immediately shows the book's language and method: the author addresses the reader directly — «O young one!» — and uses a modern analogy: the soul is like software installed on a computer, and a person's «program» is fitra, their innate nature; just as a computer is useless without software, a person cannot be happy without living according to their nature, and to avoid «viruses» the program must be «updated» through revelation. The analogy is memorable for a young reader, but the text then turns into a chain of verse and hadith quotations, a rhythm that never changes throughout the book.

The title piece introduces modesty (haya) through the story of Joseph: according to tradition, as the vizier's wife approached Joseph she covered the idols in the room; when he asked why, she said she was ashamed before them, and Joseph answered, «You feel shame before your false gods — how could I not feel shame before my Lord?» The author presents modesty as an «inner control»: whoever is ashamed before God will also be ashamed before people. Youth is then described as a blessing through hadith, the fable of the grasshopper and the ant, and the life story of a man who «wanted to save the world and ended up trying only to save himself». This is the warmest and most affecting part of the book.

«Our Examples» groups the Qur'anic stories by type of trial: trial through spouses — Noah, Lot and Pharaoh's wife Asiya; through chastity — Joseph and Mary; through a father — Abraham; through illness — Job; through worldly riches — Solomon; through children — Jacob; through one's people — Moses. This simple classification is one of the book's most useful parts, giving young readers a clear map for linking Qur'anic stories to the difficulties in their own lives.

«Youth's Test with Sexuality» turns to the book's central theme. The author describes today's young people through real problems: living away from family to study, the lack of relatives and neighbourhood support in big cities, the internet, media, bad company and sexual stimuli everywhere, combined with countless obstacles to marriage. She does not deny sexuality — she calls it a need as natural as eating and drinking, one that relaxes a person physically and mentally. As solutions she points to lowering the gaze, not approaching fornication, and marriage.

The weaknesses are just as clear in this piece. Claims such as «marriages that start with dating do not last long» rest on no research; criticisms of the nuclear family, of placing elders in care homes, of working mothers and of leaving children in nurseries «with people of unknown character» are listed in a single breath, although the author immediately adds that blaming everything on the environment is the easiest way to avoid responsibility. The text is full of exclamation marks, repetition and rough transitions; weak editing is plainly felt in places.

In the end, this is a sincere, heartfelt advice book for readers who share its religious values: sources for verses and hadith are given in footnotes, the stories are linked to young people's lives, and the author's experience as a mother and counsellor comes through. But readers looking for science-based information on adolescence, sexuality and the family will not find it here; the book is best seen as a starting point for conversation and reflection.

• Each piece addresses the reader directly with «O young one!»
• Sources for verses and hadith are given in footnotes
• Highlighted sentences in the margins
• Two short stories and a play alongside the essays