PDF of The Recent Boycotting Posts

Here is the PDF of the recent boycotting posts:

On Boycotting.

Al-Albaani on Boycotting | End | Wrongfully Looking at Misguided Muslims with Scorn, Contempt, Spite and Buried Hatred and a Discussion About Whether the Ruling Applied to Whole Groups is Applied to Individuals from those Groups

Continuing from the previous post.

Al-Albaani: Today, regretfully, my brother, the situation of the Muslims is very precarious. Today the Christians, rather the Jews, in fact the Magians live in an Islamic country as natives and the ruler does not differentiate between a Muslim and a non-Muslim, all are covered by the term citizen, and our Lord the Mighty and Majestic says, “Then will We treat the Muslims like the criminals? What is [the matter] with you? How do you judge?” [Qalam 68:35-36] for this reason this society which has reached this level of corruption … it is not permissible for an individual, righteous Muslim who acts upon his knowledge to confront this society with force because he will have to make an about turn, but rather [he should use] the force which cannot be overpowered, and that is the force of proof/evidence and clear statements [explaining the truth].

Next question.

Questioner: Also, as a completion, O Shaikh, ya’ni, a Muslim’s compassion for such a person before, ya’ni, establishing [the proof] …

Al-Albaani: It is that, all of that … ya’ni¸“Invite to the way of your Lord with wisdom and good instruction …” [Nahl 16:125] that is what this means, and in this regard I say that many of our brothers who are enthusiastic for the correct Islaam [wrongfully] look at other Muslims, who have deviated due to their ignorance of the Book and the Sunnah, with a look of scorn and contempt and spite and buried hatred.  For example, many [astray] Shaikhs permit seeking succour from the Allies [of Allaah] and the righteous, they permit other things even more readily [like] seeking intercession through them instead of the Lord of the Worlds, they permit frequenting their graves and seeking blessings [from them] by coming to them and so on. And another type [of Shaikh] forbids following the Book and the Sunnah based upon the fact that [according to them] the general folk do not understand the Book and the Sunnah, and they impose blind-following on them, and then the stance of the other people who are with us upon the Book and the Sunnah and the methodology of the Pious Predecessors is to have enmity towards these people and to hate them in a most severe manner, such that it is not possible that this person will meet that one–this is a mistake.

I say: these people [who call upon the Allies of Allaah and the righteous etc.] … I do not refrain from calling them by their [rightful] name … [i.e.,] people have ‘deviated from the truth [daaloon]’ and when I [do] say that they have ‘deviated from the truth’ there is no problem in using this expression from an Islamic perspective, for Allaah the Mighty and Majestic used this expression concerning His Messenger عليه السلام [stating] that before the revelation was sent down to him, “And He found you lost [daal] and guided [you].” [Duhaa 93:7]

Thus, there is no doubt that these people who oppose the Book and the Sunnah are misguided/lost [daaloon] … what I want to say is: as long as they are like that then they are ill and it is obligatory for us to be compassionate towards them and to deal with them with gentleness and to call them [to the Truth] as is mentioned in the previous aayah, “Invite to the way of your Lord with wisdom and good instruction, and argue with them in a way that is best.” [Nahl 16:125]

And we remain in this state until it becomes clear to us from one of them that he is haughty and denies the truth and that kindness and softness have no benefit at all with him, it is then that the Statement of our Lord the Mighty and Majestic comes in to play, “… and turn away from the ignorant.” [A’raaf 7:199]

Bring the next question.

Questioner: I mean, O Shaikh, now … so that we can move on to the second question [let me just ask about this final point] because it [i.e., the second question] is totally separate from this one … [so] is this [i.e., the answer you just gave] regarding Jamaa’ahs as a whole or [is it applied to] people on an individual basis … when it becomes clear that all of them as a group or sect or such are haughty [subsequently] when someone meets one of them individually should he apply this to them on an individual level?

Al-Albaani: No. That which is applied to a Jamaa’ah is not applied to the individual.

We say, for example, the system and laws of some of the factions present today in the Islamic world, unfortunately, are ones of disbelief, like the Ba’ath Party for example and the Communist Party, there is no doubt that these forms of government are those of disbelief, and that whoever adopts them as religion is a disbeliever.

But we know that as regards the reality in many Islamic countries, especially Syria for example, many of those people who used to affiliate [themselves] to the Ba’ath [Party] used to pray and fast and totally guard the obligatory duties, and [that] when they would be reminded and warned from affiliating to a sect such as it they would say, and their statement was invalid [i.e., incorrect] … but we understand that they have not adopted Ba’athism as a replacement for Islaam [and we know this] because they would say, ‘Yaa akhi, what can we do, we want to live,’ so the example of such a person is like any other obstinate sinner [faasiq] who does something forbidden in order to live … in order to earn a living.

And how many trades, professions and businesses many of the Muslims pursue nowadays which contain forbidden things, and when you remind them and tell them that this and that are haram, they’ll say, ‘Yaa akhi, what can we do,’ and the good one from among them will say to you, ‘Wallaahi, I’m thinking about getting something … [getting] another job which will be [Islamically] legal but until it becomes possible I’ll carry on doing what I’m doing,’ and so on. This all shows that it is not possible to declare these people to be disbelievers in the same way that we declare the system and all those who [actually] adopt it as a part of their ’aqidah to be disbelievers.

Therefore, it is possible that individuals in these factions can be found who really are disbelievers because they have adopted their system as a replacement for Islaam and [at the same time] there are individuals amongst them who are not like that and who only, as I gave you an example of just now, take it as a means of living–[but by me saying this] I do not mean that this way is permissible, what I mean is that as long as the individual has not adopted it as creed, as a system [which replaces Islaam], as an ideology, then it is not allowed to deal with them as the system itself and those who do adopt it as ’aqidah are dealt with.

End.

Al-Huda wan-Noor, 735.

Al-Albaani on Boycotting | 2 | Nowadays, Boycott, Cut off, Ostracise, Disassociate or Be Gentle?

Continuing from the first post of this series.

“So now, it is not necessary/a prerequisite that [such a] warning is coupled with ostracism or boycotting in this day and age, but as for when our society is an Islamic one then all of these issues must be brought together.

Nowadays, for example, there is a very clear example [which I will give you]: the Muslim who doesn’t keep up/maintain his prayers [and thus] to whom applies the hadith which you mentioned in your [other earlier] question, “Between a person and disbelief is abandoning the prayer, whoever abandons the prayer has disbelieved,” the correct, legislated expression concerning this man who I just mentioned is that he be called someone who is defiantly disobedient [a faasiq], if not a disbeliever who has apostatized from his religion, it is only by way of using gentler words that he be called, ‘not practicing,’ he is a faasiq, and that disbeliever is more of a faasiq than him, so [for now] we will speak about this person and then we may be in need of talking about the one who is ever more defiantly disobedient than him, i.e., the kaafir.

This Muslim who has abandoned the prayer has left obedience to Allaah in that issue, for this reason he deserves the title of faasiq: if we warned the people against him and, along with this warning, [also] connected what I just mentioned earlier, [i.e.,] boycotting him … this warning and this cutting off and this boycotting will not produce the results desired by [the implementation of] these three words : warning … cutting off … boycotting–why?

Because if you cut off from him you will find tens of people like you who will keep contact with him, and thus the situation will be turned on its head–you will be cut off from him and not him from you, and at that point, what is the advantage of you boycotting him?

This reminds me of a Syrian saying and it has a similar [version] here [in Jordan], but [whatever the case] the Syrian expression says that the people thought that a faasiq who had abandoned the prayer repented to Allaah and turned back, and for the first time he goes to the mosque to pray but finds it closed, and so says, ‘You’re closed and [so] I have a day off [from praying]!’ obviously the saying is understood.

Okay, likewise nowadays this faasiq, the one who has abandoned the prayer, when you decide to boycott him … to cut off from him … to warn against him … he doesn’t care, [and even if he doesn't say it with his tongue] his state of affairs says, ‘You’re closed and [so] I have a day off [from praying]!  You’re cutting off from me and I’ll cut off from you and distance myself from you,’ and so on.

In summary, the principle of cutting off/ostracizing today is out of the question because we are in a time when the Muslims are weak.

And this connection [that I’m about to mention] which keeps them linked together, [i.e.,] the correct Islaam, represented in his saying عليه السلام in the authentic hadith, ‘The example of the believers in their mutual love, mercy and compassion is that of the body, if one part of it complains, the rest of the body joins it in staying awake and suffering fever,’–the Muslims today are not like that.

For this reason we do not have the means which it is fitting to rely on to bring together this widespread and dispersed division of today except by relying on His Statement the Mighty and Majestic:

“Invite to the way of your Lord with wisdom and good instruction, and argue with them in a way that is best.” [Nahl 16:125]

This is now the means which it is fitting that we rely on.

So when we see a faasiq person who has turned away from performing some of what Allaah has made obligatory upon a Muslim, we admonish him and remind him and are gentle with him.

Likewise, when we see a person or people who we cannot call faasiqs because we [for example] assume that they are guarding the obligatory duties whose obligation is well-known amongst all of the Muslims, i.e., the type of things [that are so fundamental to the religion and well-known] that they are from the category of actions called, ‘known as being from the religion by necessity,’ for we may find people who perform such obligatory duties and who do not leave them, and [thus] their perseverance in those obligatory actions comes between us and the application of the term faasiq to them, understood [so far]?

Okay, yet along with that it is possible that in these people there is some deviation from the correct ’aqidah in a certain issue or in many points of ’aqidah, this is possible, like the groups whose names today we hear recorded in the books dealing with sects and history [but which] we do not find [present] with those names in the current day and age, but we do find their effects in the state of affairs of many of the Islamic jamaa’ahs or individual Muslims, the Mu’tzailah for example, the Jabariyyah, the Qadariyyah, the Khawaarij, and so on.

In these sects there used to be found people who had deviated from the Sunnah in ’aqidah and who were regarded as righteous worshippers, yet along with that would be misguided, for example, ’Umar ibn ’Ubaid al-Mu’tazili, he would be cited as an example in his righteousness and his taqwaa but he held the [belief of the] madhhab of the Mu’tazilah, so it is not said of him that he is a faasiq but rather that he strayed from the correct ’aqidah.

And this type exists today in the Muslim world even if there is no group or Jamaa’ah which [verbally] say, ‘We are Mu’tazilah,’–I haven’t heard of anyone except one man who openly declared it in this city in front of the people, he said, ‘I’m a Mu’tazili,’ he said it openly, ‘I’m a Mu’tazili,’ and he really was a Mu’tazili and [in fact] even more misguided than they were … [but] we’re not in the middle of explaining that right now …

So the point is that it is obligatory on us to be gentle with misguided people such as these too and to establish the proof against them from the Book of Allaah, the Sunnah of Allaah’s Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم, the statements of the Pious Predecessors and the Mujtahid Imaams–this is what it is obligatory for our stance to be towards those who have deviated from Islaam in either action or notion, until the Muslims become stronger and gain power and a country, then when these people are told about the correct Islaam and [still] do not restrain from the defiant disobedience [fisq] and misguidance they are upon, they then have a different ruling, [but at the same time] this ruling is not connected to individual righteous Muslims [to carry out], but is rather connected to the Muslim ruler, and perchance this is close, if Allaah so wills.

Perhaps I’ve answered your question?

Questioner: Yes, as a completion, what … [is it] likewise with non-Muslims?

Al-Albaani: Yes, it is likewise, without a doubt.

Questioner: The Jews and the Christians and so on?

Al-Albaani: Today, regretfully, my brother, the situation of the Muslims is very precarious …”

The next post.

Al-Albaani on Boycotting | 1

 

Questioner: The first [question] is concerning the topic of the ’aqidah of loyalty and disavowal [al-Walaa wal-Baraa]: is it permissible for a Muslim that the ’aqidah of loyalty and disavowal be made apparent [i.e., implemented] before, ya’ni, establishing the proof against the other person, whether that other person is a non-Muslim or someone from other than Ahlus-Sunnah, ya’ni, someone astray …

Al-Albaani: If you were to remove the term ‘loyalty and disavowal [al-Walaa wal-Baraa],’ from your question, do you think the question still holds? Because I see that a connection which holds the question together cannot be found if you remove the term ‘loyalty and disavowal?’

Questioner: No, it does not hold.

Al-Albaani: Why … I then don’t understand the question, because the completion of your question …

Questioner: Loyalty … so, the question … it’s as though it is worded incorrectly, in the negative, I mean disavowal …

Al-Albaani: Let us repeat the question. What is the question that is connected to [the term] disavowal, is it permissible for a Muslim to what?

Questioner: That, ya’ni, he starts from the person …

Al-Albaani: Now it’s clear.

Questioner: … from the action, the basis is for him to start from the action … but from a person, [his question is jumbled and not clear, he is saying that if you want to boycott someone you boycott him for the action not because of him personally, so you say the action is misguidance etc., and then afterwards based upon that that the person is misguided etc.] ya’ni, who is involved in this action before the proof being established against him, whether he is a non-Muslim or [a Muslim but] from other than Ahlus-Sunnah.

Al-Albaani: Now the question is clear. After this clarification, maybe we can replace the term, ‘disavowal,’ with another word which will make the question aimed at clearer, i.e., ‘disassociation or boycotting,’ is this correct do you think, [answer me] so I can go on to answer?

Questioner: Disassociation?

Al-Albaani: Yes, i.e., ‘Is it permissible for a Muslim to disassociate [himself] from a non-Muslim and not deal with him and to boycott him, [and] is it permissible for a Muslim to disassociate [himself] from an openly sinning Muslim who does not practice, [is it allowed for the practicing Muslim to] act upon Islaam and boycott him?’ This is what is intended from the question or something else?

Questioner: Warning, ya’ni, against him.

Al-Albaani: What?

Questioner: Warning against him and his da’wah.

Al-Albaani: Warning against him, does this warning against him necessitate cutting off and boycotting him? Say [in response to this question I just asked], ‘Of course,’ or should he maintain communication and then warn against him? Namely, the question must be clarified until we can come to know the answer.

Questioner: … so that I understand …

Al-Albaani: I’m saying, a person is warning against another, does he maintain relations with him or boycott him?

Questioner: He boycotts him.

Al-Albaani: Okay, so there is a correlation, the two issues are linked, after this clarification I now say that I can tackle the answer to the question.

Amongst our problems in this day and age is that we deal with issues based upon emotion.

[What] I want to say is that lots of the youth today who are enthusiastic about their Islaam, their religion, deal with some critical/complex fiqh issues in a manner based upon [their] emotions for Islaam … dealing with [those issues] in a manner not accompanied by knowledge drawn from the Book and the Sunnah and the methodology of the Pious Predecessors.

I believe that a question such as this, i.e., warning … cutting off … boycotting … loyalty and disavowal … these are issues that are connected to a strong Islamic society which is capable of, firstly, implementing issues such as these and secondly, is capable of benefitting from their outcome.

So now, it is not necessary/a prerequisite that [such a] warning is coupled with ostracism or boycotting in this day and age, but as for when our society is an Islamic one then all of these issues must be brought together. Nowadays, for example, there is a very clear example [which I will give you] …

The next post.

Boycotting Another Muslim | 12 | How to Deal with Someone who Has Left the Manhaj of the Salaf

Translated by Ahmed Abu Turaab

Questioner: How do you deal with or what is the ruling concerning someone who has left the manhaj of the Salaf as-Saalih from the people of knowledge or those other them, how do you deal with them and what is the ruling concerning them? Benefit us [by giving us an answer], may Allaah help you.

Al-Albaani: May Allaah bless you, it is fitting that this scholar or learner deals with the generality of Muslims on the basis of giving sincere advice, i.e., it is a must for him to always, as far as he is able, contact them personally or by phone or to write to them, [so he should] use any means he can by which he can offer some sincere advice and knowledge to these people.

And it is not fitting that just because of the occurrence of some difference in an aspect of knowledge that we make that a reason for one Muslim to distance himself from his Muslim brother.

I am totally convinced about what I am saying–with the condition that no stubbornness/obstinacy becomes apparent to me from the one who opposes our manhaj or call. If stubbornness does become apparent then what remains is [just] wasting time in contacting them, especially because a person’s abilities are limited and he cannot meet each and every individual in a town, let alone a country, let alone the world.

Thus, he must contact those people who are most likely to benefit from what he says, his communication with them, his friendship, his companionship, [those who will benefit] more than the others, so he starts as that poet said:

Copious, is knowledge, if thou seeketh it
Insufficient, is thy time, to acquire it

So start with the most important thing and then the next, [give precedence] to the most important thing and then the next in importance: this person [for example] has the propensity to understand you and respond to you more than that [other] person, so give him two portions of your time not one, there [could be] another person who deserves three portions and so on.

But if you can, do not cut off from this person who deserves one portion, only do so if his obstinacy becomes apparent to you, and obstinacy is disbelief so there is no point in wasting time with him.

And this is how the answer to the question will be; that those people who used to be on the Salafi way but who then affiliated themselves with the partisan way–it is not fitting that such a person be boycotted, rather we should follow up on him by giving him knowledge and reminding him and so on. Until the time we lose hope regarding him, Allaah forbid, and he becomes a part of the group of stubborn, obstinate ones, as he عليه السلام said, “No one in whose heart is an atom’s weight of pride will enter Paradise.” A man said, ‘O Messenger of Allaah! What if a man likes his clothes to look good and his shoes to look good?’ He said, ‘Allaah is Beautiful and loves beauty. Pride means rejecting the truth and looking down on people.” Muslim no. 285

So when you feel that a person is rejecting the truth and is looking down upon you then free yourself of him, as for the others, then you have to be with them according to the limits of your ability.

And [saying] this much is sufficient, and all praise is due to Allaah, the Lord of all the Worlds.

Al-Hudaa wan-Noor, 581.

PDF: On Boycotting

Here is the PDF version of all the separate posts in one place.  If you want to save it, right click on the link and go to ‘Save Link/Target As’:

Boycotting.

Boycotting Another Muslim | 11 | Dislike the views or the Person who Holds them?

Translated by Ahmed Abu Turaab

Questioner: O Shaikh!  Regarding hating a person, isn’t it so that a person must love his brother for the Sake of Allaah, and hate for the Sake of Allaah, give for His Sake and withhold for His Sake [too] … by hating, I should hate someone for their ideology not for their person,  if he is a Muslim and prays, not hatred …, I hate, for example, his ideology and not him personally?

Al-Albaani: I do not think there is a distinction between the two things except when the dislike of the person who is doing the action which is in opposition to the legislation leads to ostracising him, then [we say that] it is not allowed to hate him to that extent.

Namely, boycotting someone is not done just because a person falls into something which opposes the Sharee’ah, for if that were the case then the entire Islamic community would be taken to pieces because not a single one of us is free of something which another person may dislike in him, putting aside whether this hatred is regarding something justifiable–we are now only talking about hatred when it’s justifiable, so what do you think if it is for something false.

There is not a single one of us except that another person will dislike something in him. So boycotting is inapplicable due to such a dislike.  But we do not imagine that we dislike the evil action committed by this person while [at the same time] not disliking the source of the action. So these are two things which it is not possible for us to split one from the other.

But I say that it is fitting that when we dislike someone for a wrong action he has done it does not necessarily mean that we are allowed to break relations with him, clear?

And this boycotting, without doubt, is a means of educating in Islaam but it, firstly, is implemented only concerning a person who performed a disliked deed which is not customary of him, and secondly it must be noted whether the boycotting will realize the desired goal, which is to educate this person and bring him back to the correct path. So if the boycotting will realize this goal then it should be done and if not, then it shouldn’t.

Many of our practicing brothers always discuss [the issue of] boycotting a person: for example, [boycotting] someone who has left praying or is a backbiter or a tale-carrier or who does some well-known sins, so the question about whether we should boycott him is asked.  And this person they are asking about may be a relative, even a close relative through marriage or blood.

So we turn the attention of those asking this question to this principle: do you feel that if you boycott this person who is doing such and such, that it will benefit him or will his stance be, as I mention sometimes, like that of the man who used to be a sinner, someone who had left the worship of his Lord, who then repented and resolved to pray his first prayer at the mosque. He went to the mosque and found it closed, and so said, ‘You’re closed and I have a day off [from praying].’

So if this person who you want to boycott has no concern about your boycotting him, what is the benefit of it then? 

Rather, the opposite is correct–that you stay in touch with him, advising him, reminding him every time the opportunity arises.

So, firstly, boycotting is not done for some trivial reason and secondly, even if it is to be done for something which the person doing it deserves to be boycotted over, it is obligatory upon us to study the situation of the community/society we live in.

And from that about which there is no doubt is the fact that, with deep regret, the community today does not help the Muslims who want to boycott another since the reality is that he will not even care about this ostracism.

Al-Hudaa wan-Noor, 563.

Boycotting Another Muslim | 10 | Is it Correct that Innovators should not be Boycotted in this Day and Age?

Translated by Ahmed Abu Turaab

Questioner: Is what we hear correct that in this day and age boycotting the innovators should not be implemented?

Al-Albaani: He wants to say that it is not right that it should be implemented.  Is it correct that it should not be implemented?  It is not implemented, because the innovators and the disobedient Muslims sinners [faasiqs] and criminals [faajirs] are the majority today, but he is trying to say that it is not right that it is implemented, and it is as though the first person the questioner is referring to is me: so I say yes, it is as such, it is not right to implement it, and I have said this openly just now when I gave you that Syrian proverb, ‘You are closed and I have a day off,’ yes.

Questioner: But, for example, when an environment is found, and the majority in it are from Ahlus-Sunnah, for example, and thereafter some people who have deviated from the path of truth [nawaabidh] are found who innovated into the Religion of Allaah, the Mighty and Majestic, in that situation is it implemented or not?

Al-Albaani: In the Jamaa’ah itself?

Questioner: In that environment which the people of truth dominate and then innovation became apparent in it, what do you say about this situation?

Al-Albaani: It is obligatory here to use wisdom. The strong, uppermost group, if it boycotts the group which has deviated from the Jamaa’ah–going back to what we already said–will that defend/aid the group which is clinging to the Truth or will it harm them? This is as regards them [i.e., the group on the truth].

Thereafter, will it benefit those being boycotted by the Aided Group or will it harm them, the answer to this has preceded, i.e., it is not right that we act upon these affairs based upon zealousness and emotions but rather with careful deliberation, tolerance and wisdom.

Because we, for example … [imagine] one of these people deviated [from the truth], he opposed the Jamaa’ah, … [and then the reaction from those who want to cut him off will be], ‘Boycott him! Don’t be kind to him!’ [Rather you should] advise him, guide him, and so on, accompany him for a while, then when you, firstly, despair of him and, secondly, think that his infection will spread to Zaid and Bakr [i.e., other people], then he is cut off when it is believed that boycotting will be the cure, and as is said, the last cure one resorts to is cauterization [i.e., boycotting is the last resort].

Generally, nowadays, I do not advise the use of boycotting whatsoever, because it harms more than it benefits.

And the greatest proof of that is the fitnah that is on-going now in the Hijaz. The call of tawheed and the call of the Book and the Sunnah unites all of them but some of them have specific activities, whether in politics or other views which are not known from any of the people of knowledge before, and it [i.e., what they say] may be correct and it may be wrong. [But] we cannot tolerate anything new that we hear especially if it appears to us to be something which, at first suggestion [i.e., without giving it any careful thought], we don’t recognize. We attack it straight away, this is a mistake, my brother:

You want a friend with no faults
And does aloes wood [Oud] give off its fragrance without smoke?

We [earnestly] hope that the Ikhwaan al-Muslimoon are with us on Tawheed alone [if nothing else], so that we can be with them, for they are not pleased with us even in aqidah and they say that rousing these differences splits the ranks and divides the people … and so on.

These brothers [in the Hijaaz] who a group have split away from or who split away from a group [themselves], and Allaah knows best … they are with us all the way regarding the Book, the Sunnah and the methodology of the Salaf as-Saalih, but they came with something new, some of it is wrong and some of it is correct.

So why do we spread dissension, partisanship and bigotry amongst ourselves, such that whereas once we were a single block we became two, three, they became … became Surooris … and so on, Allaahu Akbar.

And nothing divided them which deserved to be split over: there is no difference in the major issues which it cannot be imagined the Salafis would differ in. We all know that the Companions differed in some issues, but their methodology was one.

For this reason if you take it that some individuals from the Ahlus-Sunnah wal-Jamaa’ah and the Aided Sect have deviated, then we deal with them with kindness and tenderness, Yaa akhi, and we try to keep them with the Jamaa’ah and we don’t ostracise them nor boycott them except when we fear something from them–and this does not become apparent straight away, i.e., just because someone has an opinion in which he disagrees [with the Jamaa’ah] and has strayed from the Jamaa’ah it is not fitting that we immediately ostracise and boycott him.

But rather we should wait and be patient until maybe Allaah, the Mighty and Majestic, guides his heart or it becomes clear to us that leaving him is better.

Al-Hudaa wan-Noor, 666.

Boycotting Another Muslim | 9 | Using the hadith of Wahshi as proof …

Translated by Ahmed Abu Turaab

Questioner: May Allaah reward you with good … a question, O Shaikh, … with us in Kuwait is a group of practising Muslim youth who do not like/feel comfortable with others although there are no takes [criticsm] on the religion of those others, but [one of these youths may say], ‘I just don’t like him, personally, I don’t feel comfortable concerning him.’ And when he is corrected he cites as proof the hadith of Wahshi and the time the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم said to him, ‘Can you hide your face from me?’ So they say that here the Prophet’s صلى الله عليه وسلم personal disposition … the man [i.e., Wahshi] came having repented [but the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم still told him to hide his face from him], so they use this hadith as a proof, if you could clarify this for us.

Al-Albaani: This hadith cannot be used as a proof in this context. It is true that he came, repentant, but in the soul of the Prophet عليه السلام was sorrow which neither the passing of days nor time could wipe out because of the fact that Wahshi killed his uncle, Hamzah.

So [concerning your question] what did this person who that other one does not feel comfortable with do? What he did is nothing.

For this reason citing this as a proof in reality shows us that we live in a time in which people try to walk before they can crawl [Editor’s. note: the Arabic proverb the Shaikh used translated literally reads, ‘… tries to become a dried raisin before he becomes a sour grape …’], and they feign knowledge whilst being ignorant, and they are not scholars. So this deduction is extremely poor because it is not compatible with the incident [mentioned in the question].

Imagine that a person unjustly, out of oppression and enmity, killed a Muslim’s brother and then came to the murdered person’s brother, repentant, and from his behaviour it is apparent that he really has repented, but the murdered person’s brother said to him, ‘Hide your face from me,’ this situation is not like that one [mentioned in the question], because this person killed his brother unjustly, and as a result he doesn’t want to disturb the [remaining] peace in his life by looking at his brother’s murderer, for example.

So this situation differs [from the one in the question], and we ask Allaah, the Mighty and Majestic, to give us understanding of the religion and to teach us its interpretation.

Questioner: I.e., is he sinful in doing that, O Shaikh?

Al-Albaani: Without doubt, because this is turning away from one another and cutting off.

Questioner: Is it not from desires?

Al-Albaani: It is, without doubt, following desires.

Al-Hudaa wan-Noor, 237.

Boycotting Another Muslim | 8 | As sly as a fox …

Translated by Ahmed Abu Turaab

Questioner: If there was, O Shaikh, a man from the common folk who prays but who, in character, is as sly as a fox, such that whoever comes across him finds it difficult to deal with him … a specific dispute occurred between you and him in which he was at fault, he advocated/defended what was wrong. It was not a dispute over a fiqh issue, just something normal, so after the debate/dispute is over, you meet him in the street and say, ‘As-Salaamu alaikum,’ but he does not reply to you, so you stop greeting him with salaam, and you are happy that he did not reply to your salutation because in that you saw an end to his evil [i.e., you don’t have to deal with him anymore]. So is this action legislated [i.e., permissible] or do I have to be happy to give him salaam every time I meet him?

Al-Albaani: If you gave him salaam every time you met him, then that is better, and if you turned away from him, then that is permissible.

Questioner: Jazaakallaahu khair.

Al-Hudaa wan-Noor, 192.