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Messages - AhmadFarooq

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GENERAL TOPICS | BOARD ANNOUNCEMENTS / Re: Touching them erases sins?
« on: February 16, 2019, 11:28:50 PM »
The guy thought it was a black stone lol

"Black stone". Was the belief that touching any and all black stones erases sins?

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GENERAL TOPICS | BOARD ANNOUNCEMENTS / Re: Touching them erases sins?
« on: February 15, 2019, 02:15:26 PM »
There are many religious activities Muslims perform because they were ordered by Allah and in order to imitate Prophet Muhammad. Imitating the Prophet's religious rituals is a source of good deeds and forgiven sins. Such simple activities and imitations - such as eating with the right hand, washing three times, putting on socks and shoes first on the right-foot etc. - serve as an easy excuse for having good deeds recorded in one's favour.

Far as I understand, generally speaking, religious rituals aren't supposed to make sense from a secular perspective.

These rituals are as imitations of Prophet Muhammad's actions and not because Muslims hold some special reverence to such inanimate objects. Also, see Kissing the Black Stone and Touching the Yemeni Corner by Shaykh AbdurRazzaq al-Badr.

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This is not how the narration is understood by scholars, even conservative ones.

The narration, and others similar to it, refer to the understanding that there are ultimately going to be a fixed number of people who will reach Heaven and Hell. When a quantity of 10 humans manages to reach Heaven, a quantity of 10 humans will go to Hell - this in order to fulfill that final fixed number.

Heaven bound humans will be rewarded because of their belief and good deeds and not due to the disbelievers taking the burden of their sins. Believers who have committed sins will still have to pay their recompense in Hell, before they will be able to enter Heaven.

Similarly, individuals going to Hell is because of their disbelief and not to save Muslims.

For details, see Does the fact that a disbeliever will be a Muslim’s ransom from the Fire mean that none of the Muslims will ever enter the Fire?

Furthermore, a general principle regarding Hadith is that it cannot directly and explicitly contradict the Qur'an. If some narration appears to do so, then either the Hadith has been misunderstood or it is unreliable and therefore rejected.

On the "Jesus choosing to sacrifice himself" front, I wanted to ask, whether this sacrifice forgives all sins of Christians or just the "original sin" of apple eating. If it is all sins, then how could just one death be enough for all the atrocities that are committed by humans over thousands of years? And if it is just the "original sin", then why is this burden on the descendants of Adam and Eve who had absolutely nothing to do with that sin?

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Quran Morality and Moral Code, Laws & QA / Re: The stolen armor !
« on: January 13, 2019, 10:51:09 PM »
Also, ⚛ Qur'ān 4(Al-Nisa'):105 | Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, Tafhim al-Qur'an (English).

The context mentioned in this Tafsir mirrors the above, original post more.

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Quran Morality and Moral Code, Laws & QA / Re: The stolen armor !
« on: January 11, 2019, 01:44:04 PM »
For those who would like a scholarly reference for this incident, see ⚛Qur'ān 4(Al-Nisa'):105 | Mufti Shafi Usmani, Tafseer-e-Ma'riful Qur'an (English).

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Aside from the verses and Hadiths regarding violence which explicitly include the context of self-defence, there is definitely a portion of scripture which does not include such conditions, at least not explicitly. In other words, scripture that calls for violence against non-Muslims without explicitly mentioning it be done only for protection against harm.

The present Hadiths and Qur'an 9:29 are significant in this regard. From what I've seen, there are three major interpretations for scripture pertaining to this subject matter.

1. The idea that such scripture, like the rest of violence pertaining verses and Hadiths, also refers only to self-defence, it's just not explicitly mentioned. For example, Qur'an 9:29 is argued to have come at a time of warfare between Muslims and Christians.

2. That Qur'an 9:29 referring to people of the Book, and Prophet's commands to destroy idol temples in Arabia are relevant to all humanity for all time. If I understood correctly, Ibn Taymiyyah argued along those lines, such as in Al Sarim-Ul-Maslool, and I have seen Wahabism argue, according to their interpretation, for the Islamic obligation to destroy all idols wherever they may exist.

3. That such scripture is relevant to only the Arabs or the people in surrounding areas, who were directly reached by Prophet Muhammad's teachings. The argument being, that since Prophet Muhammad had a direct link with God, therefore the Prophet would have been able to resolve any suspicion against Islam that a sceptical person might have had, and even provide miracles if need be. Since there would have been no reason or excuse to deny God when a Prophet is present among the people, no one had the right to deny Islam; and those who did so, deserved punishment. This punishment, during the previous Prophets' and Biblical times, was served directly by God while during  Prophet Muhammad's times was served by Muslims. This punishment is what, Qur'an 9:29 and the destruction of Arab idol temples, is referring to. People to whom Prophet Muhammad's teachings did not reach or those who lived after him, are exempt from such a punishment as they may have a legitimate excuse or unanswered question for not believing in Islam.

The narrations mentioned above might very well be referring to only the Arabs, however, they alone are definitely not enough to convince people who believe in the second interpretation. As far as I understand, the narrations include nothing to suggest their being restricted only to the Arabs.

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— Point: Allah's Messenger (ﷺ) said: "I have been ordered (by Allah) to fight against the people until they testify that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah."

The entire narration is:
Quote
Allah's Messenger (ﷺ) said: "I have been ordered (by Allah) to fight against the people until they testify that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that Muhammad is Allah's Messenger (ﷺ), and offer the prayers perfectly and give the obligatory charity, so if they perform that, then they save their lives and property from me except for Islamic laws and then their reckoning (accounts) will be done by Allah."
Source: https://www.sunnah.com/bukhari/2/18

As far as I've understood it, the narration is talking about people who have already become Muslims. I think pointing this out would've made a better, more accurate argument.

My understanding is based on the fact that it is an accepted fact non-Muslims cannot be forcefully converted, the "no compulsion is religion" argument; and if that wasn't enough, I doubt there is any difference of opinion on the matter that in Islam, non-Muslims are supposed to say Muslim prayers and pay Zakat (" the obligatory charity" in the above narration).

From my understanding this narration is a good example of things because they are so clear, it takes a longer time to realise what is obvious. The anti-Islamists, quite often, criticise Islam because, in their opinion, Islam forces non-Muslims living under Muslim rule to pay the Jizya tax. However, through this narration they also argue Islam calls for forcing non-Muslims to convert too. In other words, Islam taxes non-Muslims while at the same time it forces conversion thereby eliminating its non-Muslim population. Who is going to pay the Jizya, if all non-Muslims have to be eliminated?

This is a clear and obvious contradiction. Either there has to be a Jizya tax or there is to be forceful conversions. Both of these conditions cannot exist at the same time!

Therefore, the narration has to be talking only about Muslims and from here, you can see that this narration and others similar to it come forward during the Ridda wars after Prophet Muhammad's death.

Here you also quote Ibn Ishaq's Sirat Rasul Allah, and I believe the quoted incident is unreliable, but I could be wrong here.

The "dictator" narration you quoted from Jami`at-Tirmidhi Hadith is not the evidence which refutes this person's argument. You accused him of misquoting the Hadith, the accusation is probably correct but, in my opinion, not because of the Tirmidhi Hadith but because of the Sahih Bukhari Hadith not quoted in full.

— Point: Prophet Muhammad "created a state".

Maybe a nitpick, but Prophet Muhammad did not go to Medina for the purpose of creating a government or state, its just that majority of the people there accepted him as their leader and that naturally gave him and his followers the government.

— Point: "Unlike in other religions, Islam has misogyny..."

Did he really say "unlike". Sure, there are a number of interpretations which can be argued as misogynistic (whether those interpretations are correct or not is another matter) but to say that other religions don't have similar or even worse problems is quite an extraordinary claim. But after this he contradicts himself, saying: "... to be fair there weren't many ideologies and thoughts that were very friendly with women in the past", but apparently unfriendly ideologies don't count as misogyny in front of this person.

— Point: Qur'an 2:282

You write that "it says that a woman may err due to her emotional attachment to her husband in court and the other woman can remind her". However, the verse explicitly does not indicate anything regarding any "emotional attachment".

A better argument would've been to point out the interpretation of those scholars who argue that the verse is only providing a recommendation about the witnesses, and it is completely silent on the question of whether a single woman's testimony would be accepted or not in a court of law. According to one source, even "Ibn Taymiyyah also reasoned the deficiency of using Qur'an 2:282 to prove evidentiary discrimination against women."
Source: https://www.law.utoronto.ca/documents/lectures/religion_fadel_0710.pdf

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One interpretation by Dr. Wael Shehab: Are Bells Forbidden Music?

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GENERAL TOPICS | BOARD ANNOUNCEMENTS / Re: Message to brother Osama
« on: July 28, 2018, 08:33:48 AM »
@A proud Muslim

Can you dismiss the fact that Egyptians built the pyramids? Or that Amr-Ibn el Aas entered Egypt? You cannot easily dismiss historical facts.

One refers to what as fact, and what as theory depends on an individual's threshold of certainty. Different people have different degrees of scepticism. If the evidence for Egyptians building the pyramids, or Amr-Ibn el Aas entering Egypt was in par with Akhbar-e-Ahad, then a lot of people wouldn't consider such things as historical facts either. Some might, but not everyone can be expected to do so.

If you chose to dismiss a historical fact, then you should tell  us on what basis can you determine that a historical fact is true or not.

As I previously mentioned, most things in history are not guaranteed, however, when it comes to Akhbar-e-Ahad the reliability, as compared to other sources of Islam, decreases exponentially. This is essentially a subjective issue. Not every Muslim will consider the supporting evidence for such individual source narrations to be reliable enough to live their entire lives based on them. The following is a representation of one scholarly opinion on the matter:

Quote

As regards the matter of [the non-Muttawatar] Hadīth that is only the explanatory source. It has been transmitted through isolated reports (akhbār-i ahād) which are never considered absolutely authentic. The Prophet (sws) never arranged for their dissemination and it was left on the discretion of the people to transmit something they had heard the Prophet (sws) say or observed him do.

Although the scholars of the science of Hadīth have tried their best to sift the truth from falsehood from the oral tradition the individual reports suffer from inherit problems which render them subject to analysis and critical study. They made sure that the narrators they accept the Hadīth from were of sound memory and understanding, yet [t]hey could never guarantee that memory of a certain individual did not fail.

Through they tried from various sources to ascertain the trustworthiness of the narrators yet they could not remove human element from them. One cannot claim that a certain narrator was of absolutely infallible memory, perfect understanding, perfectly truthful and absolutely trustworthy. One can not guarantee that a certain individual heard something from the Prophet (sws) proper context and understood it as it was conceived by the Prophet (sws). We cannot make sure that he was able to transmit the saying or act in proper contextual background and did not fail to leave out all the necessary details. We also fail to make sure that all the narrators were able to communicate the original saying or act without any change in its meaning, context, references, related details and its basis in the basic religious sources. We cannot guarantee that the narrator did not change the saying because of his background, paradigm, and ability to comprehend and express what he understood without a slight alteration.

These are the inherent problems with the individual narratives because of which the scholars of the science of Hadith always considered the isolated reports as zannī source that is probable truth and not absolutely reliable thing.

Punishment Of Rajam And The Qur’an


But actually I didn't use two unproven premises to prove each other. I used a proven hadith to prove a premise. If the hadith is proven, and it says that adultery punishment is stoning, then this means that the Quran verse is referring only to fornication.

Although there are some who argue that the stoning was actually done for the crime of creating corruption in the land, however, such is irrelevant at the moment.

Coming back to the point, the premise which is unproven is that the Hadith was, in fact, an elaboration and not an abrogation of the Qur'an verse. That it was always known that the Qur'an verse was restricted only to unmarried individuals. As I've mentioned before, in contradiction to your argument, conservative scholars take the hadith as evidence that hadith can abrogate the Qur'an.

The apostasy mentioned in the hadith is meant to be the one who wage war against Muslims, and causes problems for the Islamic states.

Once more, the hadith itself does not include any such restriction. The wording of the hadith appears to include everyone without restriction. Now, although you can follow the more benign interpretation of the hadith, the fact remains that Muslim scholars over the centuries have accepted and promoted the more violent interpretation.

Now, if your interpretation is to be accepted as true, the only way majority Muslim scholars could have come to the right conclusion is if the hadith narrator had included the required context. However, such a context is absent and in-turn, this hadith becomes a cause of much injustice (injustice, according to your interpretation). This begs the question, which other Akhbar-e-Ahad hadiths are there, which are devoid of such essential context?

Your acceptance of the liberal interpretation of the apostasy hadith proves the inherent problems present in hadiths narrated by single (or very few) individuals.

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GENERAL TOPICS | BOARD ANNOUNCEMENTS / Re: Message to brother Osama
« on: July 28, 2018, 08:32:56 AM »
@Mohamed Saif,

First, I should make clear that I'm not rejecting any Hadith, just asserting that different people have different thresholds of certainty. One group of Muslims can be completely fine with Akhbar-e-Ahad, while a second group cannot. And then there would be a third group in the middle: usually being fine with Akhbar-e-Ahad, unless they are related to extremely important matters such as capital punishments, in which case they would subscribe to the concept of no punishment in the presence of reasonable doubt, and Akhbar-e-Ahad would definitely figure as reasonable doubt for them.

As far as I've understood, on the matter of the Hadith being used as a source of Shariah, there are three important interpretations.

One is the complete and absolute belief in all Hadith literature. Even going to the extent of believing an activity not performed during the Prophet's time is also prohibited. For example, since birthdays were not celebrated by the Prophet's companions, therefore such an activity must be prohibited. From what I've seen, such interpretation is followed by the majority of lay/common Muslims. This is something, not even conservative scholars subscribe to since there are more than a few Hadith that contradict each other, or are known to be fabricated but still managed to get recorded in the Saheeh Hadith books. This interpretation is significant not because of theological evidence in support of it, but because of the large number of Muslims who believe in it.

Second is the belief that all Hadith are by-default part of God's everlasting Shariah unless there is some additional evidence that would put the Hadith in doubt. Suspicions, such as one Hadith being contradicted by a more historically reliable Hadith, or by some Qur'an verse etc. Most conservative scholars would subscribe to this interpretation.

In contradiction, the third group, practically speaking, follows the idea that Hadith are by-default not part of everlasting Shariah. They argue that since Prophet Muhammad was given the responsibility to spread the religion far and wide, to spread God's divine Shariah, its obligations and prohibitions to all the people of the world until the Day of Judgement, he must have fulfilled this obligation in as public a manner as possible. He must have mentioned such theological knowledge to as many people as possible, as has happened with the Qur'an and a smaller portion of the Hadith, the Muttawatar Ahadith. Rest of the scripture i.e. the Akhbar-e-Ahad, where the Prophet is found addressing only a few individuals were his personal opinions or recommendations in his capacity as the judge, leader, father, husband, elder etc. of his people. The Imam Muslim reported date palm grafting hadith is significant in this regard.

Akhbar-e-Ahad can be considered as part of divine Shariah only when they go along with the Qur'an - hadith cannot abrogate the Qur'an. When such appears to be happening, then that particular hadith is either historically unreliable or has its meaning misunderstood.

So how do we come to a proper conclusion?  Should Apostates be killed or not or should adulterers be stoned or not?  How are we supposed to implement the Shariah if we cant come to a certain conclusion?

Conclusions can be drawn in the same way they have been drawn for centuries. Going through all the evidence and deciding for oneself, which interpretation holds more water. In a lot of cases, which conclusion is right and which is incorrect is not as important as having sincere intentions and making sincere efforts to find the right path, no matter what that path may be.

A Muslim can become a scholar to be at the best position to come to the right conclusion, but since for general lay Muslims such is usually impractical, the easier method is to go through the brief evidence put forth by the eminent scholars of each interpretation.

Regarding which interpretation should be implemented, the Qur'an 42:38 concept of: اَمْرُهُم شُوْرٰی بَينَهُمْ (Muslims, who settle their affairs with mutual consultation) is the practical method which has been agreed upon by conservative scholars for centuries. However, unlike the current status quo, a good argument can be made for common Muslims to also become a part of this consultation by educating themselves on the limited related matter, instead of blindly accepting and believing in error prone humans.

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GENERAL TOPICS | BOARD ANNOUNCEMENTS / Re: Message to brother Osama
« on: July 27, 2018, 08:13:07 PM »
First of all, if you would like to dismiss hadiths, then you should also consider dismissing historical facts.

Sure, why not. If the historical evidence is less than that of the Qur'an, those historical "facts" can also be considered unreliable. However, it should be pointed out that the truthfulness of those historical facts is usually inconsequential.

The one who gets decide that the narration is proven is the one who has the proof. It's not about who decides that narration is proven. It's about who has the proof to decide.

And what exactly is that "proof"? Is it sufficient evidence? If so, considered "sufficient" by whom? Imam Bukhari, Imam Muslim, Imam Hanbal or Imam Albani?

Additionally, since no new "proof" has come out for over a thousand years now, what was Imam Albani doing confirming and rejecting Hadiths, in the twentieth century? How could he dare term a Hadith as weak, when another scholar, a thousand years previously, considered it as reliable? Aren't the two drawing their conclusions from the same "proof"?

Transmissions are not taken except from trustworthy narrators, and this is known by his daily life and how he interacts with people, and how he memorizes things.

Transmissions are taken from a variety of sources, sometimes trustworthy, sometimes not. Human scholars decide which transmission is trustworthy and which isn't, and a lot of times they differ with each other on the matter. One transmission believed trustworthy by one group of scholars might be unreliable in the eyes of a second group.

Furthermore, as I mentioned before, a majority of the narrations are Khabr-e-Ahad. You might not have a problem believing in them, but other Muslims of a more sceptical nature cannot be expected to absolutely believe in them too.

Very well, I would like to see an authentic that is in a contradiction with the Quran. ... It wouldn't actually be a contradiction if the punishment of lashes was for fornication and not adultery. The hadith proves that adultery has another punishment, and that the zany mentioned in the Quran was meant to be the one who had intercourse before marriage.

The Qur'an verse never differentiates between the married and unmarried. Your argument against a contradiction here, is based on circular reasoning i.e. employing two unproven premises to prove each other. Either you have to prove, using external evidence, that the Qur'an verse is referring only to fornication; or starting from the other end, you have to prove that the Hadith is not a later abrogation (in other words a contradiction) of the Qur'an verse.

In fact, according to the interpretations I've read, the case of stoning is used as proof by conservative scholars that similar to how one Qur'an verse can abrogate another, at times, the Hadith can also abrogate a Qur'an verse. Such thinking is supported by the content of Qur'an 4:25, in which the punishment for former female slaves, regarding the crime of adultery, is half that of free women. Obviously, there's no "half" of stoning to death.

Additionally, some would argue the punishment for apostasy in the Hadith, as another example of a contradiction. The Qur'an mentions individuals repeatedly committing apostasy, but never mentions any punishment for them; however, the Hadith calls for the capital punishment. If apostates were to be killed, how can they repeatedly commit the crime?

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