Abū Hurairah relates that a person asked the Holy Messenger (peace and blessings of Allah be to him) who is the most deserving of a favoured treatment. The Holy Messenger said, “Your mother.” The man again asked who came next. The Holy Messenger again said, “Your mother.” On his asking for the third time, the Holy Messenger again repeated, “Your mother.” When the man asked for the fourth time, the Holy Messenger, “Your father, and after him your near relatives in order of priority.”
(Bukhari, Muslim)
Islam grants utmost rights to women. Some of the rights of Muslim women are so distinguished that they cannot be traced in any other system of life. Here, in this hadīth, the Holy Messenger (peace and blessings of Allah be to him) establishes the position of the mother in a family – three times more than that of father. The jurists and scholars of Islam argue that the position of the mother three times higher than that of the father suggests the responsibility of the mother in bearing the child for a long period of about nine months, giving birth to him/her, and rearing him/her for years in the best possible manner.
The Qur’ān also enjoins the believers to be always good and considerate to parents, particularly the mother: “And We have enjoined upon man (to be good) to his parents: In travail upon travail did his mother bear him and in years twain was his weaning” (31:14).
In another hadīth the Blessed Messenger says that Paradise lies beneath the feet of the mother.