Amongst
the most important replies that I have given, is my reply concerning the
one who has deviated to the point where he censures the importance of studying
the branches [furu'] of jurisprudence, and we seek refuge in Allah from
the deviation of such a wandering deviant. Would that he simply had claimed
independent reasoning (ijtihad) for himself only, and Allah is his reckoner,
but abandoned the call of Muslims to leave that which is incumbent upon
them. In our reply to such a one, we make mention what the scholars of
the methodological bases of Islamic jurisprudence (usuli’un) and the Imams
of jurisprudence themselves have said about such a matter. As for my labelling
him a deviant, it is only because he has desired to impose upon common
people the precious rank of absolute independent reasoning [ijtihad], about
which Muhammad an-Nabigha said,
And ijtihad in the land of the Moroccans,
The western phoenix has taken to flight with it.
I say
in reply, that the following of qualified scholarship (taqlid) is
an obligation on anyone other than an absolute mujtahid. I shall make mention
of all his prerequisites if Allah wills. [Sidi Abdullah Ould Hajj Ibrahim]
has said in his Maraqi as-Sa’ud:
“[taqlid]
is necessary for other than the one who has achieved the rank of absolute
ijtihad. Even if he is a limited [mujtahid] who is unable [to perform
absolute ijtihad].”
Commenting
on this line, [Sidi Abdullah] said in Nashru al-bunud,
“It
means that taqlid is an obligation on anyone who is not an absolute mujtahid,
even if he has achieved the limited rank of ijtihad muqayyad . . . [until
he says], ‘And ask the people of the reminder, if you yourselves do not
know.’”
By
using the line of Muhammad an-Nabigha above, I am in no way claiming that
all ijtihad has been severed in every land; how [could I say such a thing]
when [Sidi Abdullah] says in Maraqi as-sa’ud:
“The
earth will never be void of a mujtahid scholar until its very foundations
shake.”
He
also said,
“[Regarding]
the necessity of binding to a specific madhhab, the [scholars] have mentioned
its obligation upon anyone falling short [of the conditions of ijtihad].”
He
says in Nashru al-bunud,
“It
means that it is incumbent for whoever falls short of achieving the rank
of absolute ijtihad to follow a particular madhhab.”
Again,
in Maraqi as-Sa’ud, Sidi Abdullah says,
“The
consensus today is on the four, and all have prohibited following [any]
others.”
He says
in Nashru al-bunud,
“This
means that the consensus of the scholars today is on the four schools of
thought, and I mean by the schools of Malik, Abu Hanifa, Shafi’i and Ahmad.
Indeed, all of the scholars have prohibited following any other school
of an independent and absolute mujtahid since the eighth century when the
school of Dawud adh-Dhahiri died out and until the 12th Century and all
subsequent ones.”
In the
chapter concerning inferential reasoning, from Maraqi as-sa’ud, [Sidi Abdullah]
says,
“As
for the one who is not a mujtahid, then basing his actions on primary textual
evidence [Qur’an and hadith] is not permissible.”
He says
in Nashru al-bunud,
“It
means that it is prohibited for other than a mujtahid to base his actions
upon a direct text from either the Book or the Sunna even if its transmission
was sound because of the sheer likelihood of there being other considerations
such as abrogation, limitations, specificity to certain situations, and
other such matters that none but the mujtahid fully comprehends with precision.
Thus, nothing can save him from Allah the Exalted excepted following a
mujtahid. Imam al-Qarafi1 says,
‘And
beware of doing what some students do when they reason directly from the
hadith, and yet they don’t know their soundness, let alone what has been
mentioned [by the Imams] concerning the subtleties involved in them; by
doing this, they went astray and led others astray. And whoever interprets
a verse or hadith in a manner that deviates from its intended meaning without
proof [dalil] is a kafir.’”
As
for the conditions of the absolute and independent ijtihad, they are mentioned
in the Maraqi as-sa’ud in the following line and what follows:
“And
that [word ‘faqih’2] is synonymous with
the [word] ‘mujtahid’ coupled with those things which bear upon
[him] the burden of responsibility,
Such
as his being of extreme intelligence by nature, and there is some debate
about one who is known to reject juristic analogy [qiyas]
He
knows the [juristic] responsibilities through intellectual proofs unless
a clear transmitted proof indicates otherwise.
[Sidi
Abdullah] says [in his commentary] Nashru al-bunud,
“This
means that among the conditions of ijtihad is that [the mujtahid] knows
that he must adhere to the intellectual proof which is the foundational
condition [al-bara’atu al-asliyya3] until a transmitted
proof from a sacred law indicates otherwise.”
He
then goes on to mention the other conditions of a mujtahid:
[The
sciences of] grammar, prosody, philology, combined with those of usul and
rhetoric he must master.
According
to the people of precision, [he must know] where the judgements can be
found without the condition of having memorized the actual texts.
[All
of the above must be known] according to a middle ranked mastery at least.
He must also know those matters upon which there is consensus.
[Moreover,
he must know] things such as the condition of single hadiths and what carries
the authority of great numbers of transmissions; also [knowledge of] what
is sound and what is weak is necessary.
Furthermore,
what has been abrogated and what abrogates, as well as the conditions under
which a verse was revealed or a hadith was transmitted is a condition that
must be met.
The
states of the narrators and the companions [must also be known]. Therefore,
you may follow anyone who fulfils these conditions mentioned above according
to the soundest opinion.
So,
consider all of the above-mentioned, and may Allah have mercy upon you,
and [may you] see for yourself whether your companion is characterized
by such qualities and fulfils these conditions—and I highly doubt it. More
likely, he is just pointing people to himself in his demands that the people
of this age take their judgements directly from the Book and Sunna. If,
on the other hand, he does not possess the necessary conditions, then further
discussion is useless.
In
Muhammad ‘Illish’s, Fath al-‘Ali al-Malik, there are many strong rebukes
for those who wish to force people to abandon the study of the judicial
branches and take directly from the Book and the Sunna. The actual text
of the question put to him is as follows:
“What
do you say about someone who was following one of the four Imams, may Allah
the Exalted be pleased with them, and then left claiming that he could
derive his judgements directly form the Qur’an and the soundly transmitted
hadiths, thus leaving the books of jurisprudence and inclining towards
the view of Ahmad bin Idris? Moreover, he says to the one who clings to
the speech of the Imams and their followers, “I say to you ‘Allah and His
Messenger say’, and you reply ‘Malik said’ and ‘Ibn al-Qasim said’ or ‘Khalil
said.’”
To
this, Imam ‘Illish replies:
“My
answer to this all this is as follows: Praise be to Allah, and Prayer and
Safety be upon our Master Muhammad, the Messenger of Allah. It is not permissible
for a common person to abandon following the four Imams and take directly
from the textual sources of the Qur’an and the hadiths for the simple reason
that this entails a great many conditions that have been clarified in the
books of usul. Moreover, these conditions are rarely met by the great scholars,
especially in these last days in which Islam has become a stranger just
as it began a stranger.”
Ibn
‘Uyyana, may Allah be pleased with him, has said,
“The
hadiths are a source of error except for the jurists.”
What
he means is that people, other than the scholars, might interpret a tradition
based on an apparent meaning, and yet [the hadith may] have another interpretation
based on some other hadith that clarifies the meaning or some proof that
remains hidden [to the common people]. After a long discussion, he remarks,
“That
as for their saying, ‘How can you leave clear Qur’anic verses and sound
hadiths and follow the Imams in their ijtihads, which have a clear probability
of error,’”
His
answer to them is as follows:
“Surely
the following of our [rightly guided] Imams is not abandoning the Qur’anic
verses or the sound hadiths; it is the very essence of adhering to them
and taking our judgements from them. This is because the Qur’an has not
come down to us except by means of these very Imams [who are more worthy
of following] by virtue of being more knowledgeable than us in [the sciences
of] the abrogating and abrogated, the absolute and the conditional, the
equivocal and the clarifying, the probabilistic and the plain, the circumstances
surrounding revelation and their various meanings, as well as their possible
interpretations and various linguistic and philological considerations,
[not to mention] the various other ancillary sciences [involved in understanding
the Qur’an] needed.
“Also,
they took all of that from the students of the companions (tabi’in) who
received their instruction from the companions themselves, who received
their instructions from the Lawgiver himself, may Allah bless him and grant
him peace, divinely protected from every mistake, who bore witness that
the first three generations of Muslims would be ones of virtue and righteousness.
Furthermore, the prophetic traditions have also reached us through their
means given that they were also more knowledgeable than us through their
means given that they were also more knowledgeable than those who came
after them concerning the rigorously authenticated (sahih), the well authenticated
(hasan), and the weak (da’if) channels of transmission, as well as the
marfu’u4, mursal5, mutawatir6,
ahad7, mu’dal8 and gharib9
transmissions.
“Thus,
as far as this little band of men is concerned, there is only one of two
possibilities: either they are attributing ignorance to Imams whose knowledge
is considered by consensus to have reached human perfection as witnessed
in several traditions of the truthful Lawgiver, upon him be prayers and
peace, or they are actually attributing misguidance and lack of din to
Imams who are all from the best of generations by the testimony of the
magnificent Messenger himself, may Allah bless him and grant him peace.
Surely, it is not the eyes that are blind, but blind are the hearts in
our breasts.
As
for their saying to the one who imitates Malik, for example, “We say to
you ‘Allah says’ or ‘the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant
him peace, says’ and you reply, ‘Malik says’, or ‘Ibn al-Qasim says’, or
‘Khalil says’, for example,” our response is that the follower who says,
“Malik says . . . etc.,” means that, “Malik says based on his deep understanding
of the Word of Allah, or of the words of the Messenger, or of those firmly
adhering to the actions of the companions, or of the tabi’in who understood
clearly the Word of Allah and the word of the Messenger of Allah or took
their example from the actions of His Messenger.” And the meaning of [a
follower] saying “Ibn al-Qasim said . . .” is that he has [faithfully]
transmitted what Malik said based on his understanding of the Word of Allah
or of what Ibn al-Qasim himself understood from the word of Allah the Most
Exalted. And the meaning of him saying, “Khalil said . . . .”, for example,
is that he is transmitting only from those [Imams] aforementioned. As for
Malik and Ibn al-Qasim, they are both Imams whose spiritual and judicial
authority is agreed upon by unanimous consensus of this Umma; and they
are both from the best of generations.
As
for the one who leaves their leadership and says, “Allah said and His Messenger
said . . . ,” he has relied solely on his own understanding despite the
fact that he is incapable of having any precision in the verses and hadiths
that he quotes since he is unable even to provide chains of transmission
[with any authority], let alone that he lacks knowledge concerning the
abrogated, the absolute and the conditional, the ambiguous and the clarifying,
the apparent and the textual, the general and the specific, the dimensions
of the Arabic and the cause for revelation, the various linguistic considerations,
and other various ancillary sciences needed. So, consider for yourself
which is preferable: the word of a follower who simply quotes the understanding
of Malik, an Imam by consensus—or the word of this ignoramus who said “Allah
said and His Messenger said . . . .” But it is not the sight that goes
blind, but rather the hearts in our breasts.
Furthermore,
know that the origin of this deviation is from the Dhahiriyya10
who appeared in Andalucia [Muslim Spain] and whose power waxed from a period
until Allah obliterated all traces of them until this little band of men
set about to revive their beliefs. Imam al-Barzuli said, “The first one
ever to attack the Mudawwana11 was Sa’id bin al-Haddad
.”
If
you consider carefully the above-mentioned texts, you will realize that
the one who censures you from following [the Imams] is truly a deviant.
And I am using the word “deviant” to describe them only because the scholars
[before me] have labelled this little band and their view (madhhab) as
deviant. Moreover, you should know that those who condemn your adherence
to the Imams have been fully refuted by Muhammad al-Khadir bin Mayyaba
with the most piercing of refutations, and he himself called them, in his
book, “the people of deviation and heterodoxy.” He called his book, Refuting
the people of deviation of heterodoxy who attack the following [taqlid]
of the Imams of independent reasoning, and I used to have a copy but no
longer do. So, my brother, I seriously warn you from following the madhhab
of these people and even from sitting in their company, unless there is
an absolute necessity, and certainly from listening to anything they have
to say, because the scholars have declared their ideas deviant. Ibn al-Hajj
says in his book, al-Madkhal,
“Umar
ibn al-‘Aziz said, ‘Never give one whose heart is deviant access to your
two ears, for surely you never know what may find fixity in you.’”
I ask
Allah to make you and me from those who listen to matters and follow the
best of them.
Murabtal
Haaj, Mauritania
