Keeping a promise

To make a promise is, in simply put, to ‘declare or give an assurance that one will do or refrain from something.’ Synonyms of promise include pledge, oath, vow, covenant and word. Promise is a legally binding declaration that gives the person to whom it is made a right to expect or to claim the […]

To make a promise is, in simply put, to ‘declare or give an assurance that one will do or refrain from something.’ Synonyms of promise include pledge, oath, vow, covenant and word. Promise is a legally binding declaration that gives the person to whom it is made a right to expect or to claim the performance or forbearance of a specified act. Thus, this makes every promise an obligation. And like a contract or agreement, every obligation is a commitment that must be fulfilled; or a debt that must be paid. Allah (SWT) asserts in Qur’an 5:1 “O ye who believe! Fulfill (all) obligations.” Keeping a promise is, therefore, as important and valuable as making one.
Broadly, there are three kinds of obligations. The first is the obligation between man and his Creator, God. This includes divine obligations that arise from our spiritual relationship with Allah (SWT). For instance, every Muslim makes, by the profession of his faith, a covenant with Allah (SWT) to observe salat five times daily. The second is man’s promise with himself. In our human and material life, we undertake mutual obligations; expressed as well as implied. We enter into commercial and social contracts. Marriage is one of the social contracts we enter in to; making promises.
The third is the obligation between man and the entire humanity. For example, if our individual country or state or professional organisation enters into a treaty with another group, every person in the country or state or professional organisation is bound, as far as lies in his human powers, to respect such tacit conventions; unless they run contrary to the teachings of Islam, in which case, it is preferred he moves out of such a society. There are also tacit obligations in the characters of a host and guest as well as in an employer and the employed which every man or woman of faith is required to honour conscientiously. In all these, we have a responsibility to faithfully fulfill all obligations.
Discharging an obligation or keeping a promise means honouring it. To keep a promise is to act upon it; and never to break it. Very unfortunately though, people today make promises, which from the onset, they actually had no intention of keeping. Islam forbids such because it is an act of hypocrisy. The Prophet (SAW) said: “The traits of a hypocrite are three: If he speaks, he lies; if he makes a promise, he breaks it; if he is entrusted with something, he betrays the trust.” Breaking a promise is not in the character of the righteous. Besides destabilising the person to whom the promise was made, those who break promises also suffer from troubled conscience.
The breach of promises by contemporary leaders, particularly politicians, is a factor in many of our collective woes today. The most common epithet for a typical Nigerian politician is that he is a ‘skilled’ promise breaker. In fact, some Nigerians believe that a politician would be the last person to be trusted in the world of promise keeping. Corporate breaking of promise or dishonouring of a set of agreements reached between government and labour unions is one regretful disservice done over the years to public perception of promise keeping in Nigeria. Sometimes, government officials sign agreements with workers’ representatives even when they knew for certain that the terms of such pacts are not implementable. In other times too, even viable agreements are just simply ignored and allowed to fail. This is most unfortunate.
Social and commercial promises too are sooner than later breached by many of us. Dozens of promises are violated sometimes even before they mature. A teacher who pledged at the point of recruitment to be truly dedicated to his job breaches his pledge in less than four months after assuming duty by habitually going late to work. A night watchman who promised at the point of employment to be honestly vigilant in his duty soon violates his declaration by always sleeping on duty. A driver who swore to remain committed soon becomes dishonest in the discharge of his responsibilities. Tailors, carpenters, tenants and landlords may not also be good examples of people who keep their promises in contemporary Nigeria. To discuss the notoriety of tailors in promise violation indeed deserves an exclusive piece. 
As marriage relationships get older, some husbands and wives flout their respective wedding promises. While dating, a young suitor would declare to his fiancé that she is forever “the only ‘sugar’ in his tea;” calling her with the most affectionate and pleasant names such as darling, sweetheart, love, babe, honey, etc. The extent to which the use of these names survives in a man’s bond with his wife, in my opinion, illustrates how far he could be trusted as a promise keeper. In a piece written some years ago by one of the ace columnists in Daily Trust on Saturday, Hajiya Aisha Umar-Yusuf, the promise to retain such friendly names is breached as the relationship between couples ‘deflates’ over time. She stated in that piece, which was a narrative of a survey she conducted, that when a woman is delivered of her first child, her name changes in her husband’s phone contact from sweetheart, for instance, to Mama-Nabeel (if it were a baby-boy) or Mama-Jameelah (if it were a baby-girl). After a second or third child, the wife’s name again changes in the phone book to ‘Wahala.’
Breaking a promise is a sin in Islam. Allah (SWT) will ask about every promise made by us as asserted in Qur’an 17:34 “…and fulfill (every) promise, for (every) promise will be enquired it to (on the Day of Reckoning).” This is, perhaps, why it is often said that a ‘promise is a debt;’ because every soul will be questioned by Allah (SWT) about all the promises it vowed to keep. A failed promise, however, attracts no sanctions on condition that it was made without any deliberate intention to dishonour it. May Allah (SWT) guide us to be among those who faithfully keep to their promises and guard us against the devilish act of promise violation, amin.