On May 14, 2012 in Articles, front page hadeeth, Hadeeth of the Month

بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَنِ الرَّحِيمِ

All praise is for Allah, The Mighty, the Most High, and may His peace and blessings be upon the final Prophet and Messenger, Muhammad Ibn Abdullah and upon his family and companions.

To proceed,
On the authority of Abdullah Ibn Amr (Radiyallahu anhu) who said that the Messenger of Allah (Sallallahu alaihi wa salam) said:

أَرْبَعٌ مَنْ كُنَّ فِيهِ كَانَ مُنَافِقًا خَالِصًا ، وَمَنْ كَانَتْ فِيهِ خَصْلَةٌ مِنْهُنَّ كَانَتْ فِيهِ خَصْلَةٌ مِنَ النِّفَاقِ حَتَّى يَدَعَهَا إِذَا اؤْتُمِنَ خَانَ ، وَإِذَا حَدَّثَ كَذَبَ ، وَإِذَا عَاهَدَ غَدَرَ ، وَإِذَا خَاصَمَ فَجَرَ.

“There are four qualities, whoever possesses them all is a complete hypocrite, and whoever possesses a trait from amongst them, then he possesses a trait of hypocrisy until he abandons it: When he is entrusted with something he proves untrustworthy, when he speaks he lies, when he makes a promise he doesn’t fulfill it and when he argues he becomes confrontational and offensive.” (Collected in Saheeh Al Bukhari and Muslim)

Imam Abdur Rahman Ibn Nasr As Sa’di (may Allah have mercy on him) commented on this hadeeth in his book Bahja tu Quloob ul Abrar Wa Qurra tul Uyoon ul Akhyar Pg.29-31:
“Hypocrisy (i.e. Nifaq) is the source of perdition and evil. It entails an external display of good and an internal desire for malevolence and evil. And this description is inclusive of major hypocrisy (i.e. Nifaq Al Akbar), which is related to belief (i.e. Aqeedah), wherein the individual divulges outwardly that he is indeed a Muslim while, in fact, he conceals disbelief.
This type of hypocrisy removes the individual from the fold of Islam completely, and he subjects himself to being in the lowest depths of hell. Allah described these types of hypocrites with the most vile and repugnant characteristics such as; kufr (i.e. disbelief), lack of faith (i.e. Iman), mockery of the religion and those who adhere to it, inclining completely towards the enemies of Islam in order to share in their animistic sentiment towards the religion, and these types of people are present in every era, especially in the time that we are living in today wherein materialism, rejection of Allah (i.e. God) and callers to liberalism and social decadence have become more prevalent and more repressive.
However the subject of this hadeeth is the second type of hypocrisy, which is the hypocrisy in action (i.e. Nifaq Al Amali), and even though it does not remove the individual from the religion altogether, it is a gateway to disbelief (i.e. Kufr). And if these four evil traits are found collectively in an individual, then he has gathered every type of evil and has exposed himself to the traits of the hypocrites. For truthfulness (i.e. Sidq), fulfilling the things you have been entrusted with, standing by your promises and vigilantly satisfying the rights of others is from the noblest forms of good that you can engage in and more specifically from the characteristics of the believers.
And whoever neglects any one of these traits, then he destroys one of the core obligations of Islam and Iman (i.e. faith), so what do you think about a person who neglects them all?!
Dishonesty in narrating includes being dishonest when narrating on Allah and the Messenger of Allah (Sallahu alaihi wa salam) the one whom, if an individual lies on him intentionally, then he should take his seat in the Hell-fire:

مَنْ كَذَبَ عَلَيَّ مُتَعَمِّدًا فَلْيَتَبَوَّأْ مَقْعَدَهُ مِنَ النَّارِ

“Whoever lies on me intentionally then let him take his seat in the Hell-fire.” (Collected in Bukhari)

And Allah says:

وَمَنْ أَظْلَمُ مِمَّنِ افْتَرَى عَلَى اللَّهِ الْكَذِبَ

“And who is more oppressive than the one who lies on Allah…”

This type of dishonesty is also inclusive of narrating the reality of a particular condition either in totality or partially. And when you find that this is case of an individual, then he has joined in a quality from the core traits of the hypocrites, which is dishonesty and the Prophet (Sallahu alaihi wa salam) said about this trait:

إِيَّاكُمْ وَالْكَذِبَ فَإِنَّ الْكَذِبَ يَهْدِى إِلَى الْفُجُورِ وَإِنَّ الْفُجُورَ يَهْدِى إِلَى النَّارِ وَإِنَّ الرَّجُلَ لَيَكْذِبُ وَيَتَحَرَّى الْكَذِبَ حَتَّى يُكْتَبَ عِنْدَ اللَّهِ كَذَّابًا

“Avoid lying for indeed lying leads to indecency and indecency leads to the hell-fire. Indeed a man will never cease lying until he is written with Allah as a liar…” (Collected in Saheeh Al Bukhari)

When he is entrusted with some important affairs such as; the rights of others or the secrets of others, he proves untrustworthy and fails to fulfill his trust, so where is his faith (i.e. Iman)? And where is the fulfillment of the basic requisites of his Islam? He who fails to fulfill the promises  that are between him and Allah as well as those promises that are between him and others, exemplifies a most despicable quality from the traits of the hypocrites.

Likewise, the one who is not conscious of the rights, as well as the wealth of others and seizes the opportunity to take advantage of them, disputes concerning the wealth of others without due right in order to claim something that he has no right to or to deny a right that  he owes. This is a quality that cannot possibly be united in the heart of man who has an ounce of true Iman (i.e. faith) that would suffice him from resorting to such malignant behavior. This quality truly negates Iman (i.e. faith) in the worst way.

Understand something O Reader, that from principles of Ahlus Sunnah Wal Jama’ah is that it is possible for the qualities of evil and the qualities of good to be combined in the heart of the servant of Allah, as well as the qualities of Iman (i.e. true faith) and the qualities of Kufr (i.e. disbelief) and Nifaq (i.e. hypocrisy) and he is deserving of punishment or reward depending on the extent of the quality that necessitates it. There are many texts from the Qur’an and Sunnah that validate and substantiate this principle.

Therefore it is incumbent upon us that we work by every text found in the Qur’an and the Sunnah and to believe in all of them and to distance ourselves from the Minhaj (i.e. methodology) of the Khawarij, those who reject the textual evidences that indicate the possibility of the continuance of Iman (i.e. faith) as well as the religion of an individual, even if he falls victim to sin, regardless of how grave it is, so as long as he doesn’t embark upon those acts, by which, the perpetrator of them would be considered a disbeliever Islamically and would ultimately remove him from the religion altogether.

The sect of the Khawarij rejects all of this, and considers the one who commits any of the major sins or does something that would be regarded by the religion as Kufr (i.e. disbelief) or Nifaq (i.e. hypocrisy) to be a disbeliever of the religion and will dwell in the Hell-fire forever. This methodology is erroneous evidenced by the texts of the Qur’an and the Sunnah and the consensus (i.e. Ijmaa’a) of the predecessors of this Ummah.”

Translated by Shadeed Muhammad on Thursday May 10, 2012 corresponding to the 19th of Jamad ul Thani 1433H. in the City of Philadelphia, Pa.

 

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