Madinat al-Muslimeen Islamic Message Board
| Chain Letter from "Sheikh Ahmed" |
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| Anonymous |
| 09/26/00 at 18:34:44 |
| [Moderator's Note: This is the chain letter that keeps going around and this time came in through the Anonymous link. This has been proven inauthentic. Please read what follows.] [quote] Dear Muslims: This is a letter from Saudi Arabia. It is addressed to all Muslims. It is the word of Sheikh Ahmed The watchman of the Prophet Muhammed^Òs mosque (PBUH).......................... [rest of letter deleted] [/quote] |
| Re: Chain Letter from "Sheikh Ahmed" |
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| Anonymous |
| 09/26/00 at 18:37:36 |
| About chain letters: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Forwarded message ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ From: "Osama K Shana'a" <osama@leland.Stanford.EDU> Assalam Aleikum wa Rahmatullah, I just wrote this e-mail to all of you to read it carefully and warn you about an e-mail that is currently circulating on the e-mail lists and you might find it here and there. The e-mail is compiled message claimed to be from Saudi Arabia and specifically from Sheikh Ahmed who they claim to be a guardian and a servant in the mosque of the prophet in Madina. The message basically says that the prophet cam to that guy in a dream and said to him a bunch of things discibing how his muslim umma are going astary and.. and.. The interesting part is that the message says that the prophet told the guy to distribute the message (30 copies in exact) and if any one who reads it and does not distribute it he'll have a bad luck, like lose of money, or lose his son or.... Now this message is nothing but a LIE. There is no Sheikh in Madina inside the masjid of the prophet by the name Ahmed. Moreover, this is an OLD message, it appeared as far as I recall in 1983 when I was in Saudi Arabia at that time and tons of copies have been made (no e-mail was there at that time). The Saudi big scholars announced clearly that this message is nothing but a lie on the prophet (SAAW) and a dirty way to play with muslims emotions and they banned it and even put punishments to those who distribute it. It then re-appeared in 1987 and this time in Jordan when I was a student there, and Jordanian scholars did the same thing and banned it and clarified its falsehood on the TV. It is surprizing to me that this message keeps comming from now and then and this time in the US after more than 15 years of its invention but of course using the high-Tech means, the internet! I received this message this week 4 times one of which was through our ISSU web page feed-back form. Interestingly enough, the guy included besides my name 29 others giving a total of 30 as the mesage requested! of course the guy is a brother that fell in the trap of this ugly false message. So I hope non of you fall in the same trap and if you get a copy of that message from a brother/sister, just inform him/her about the falsehood of that message and then hit the " D " key. I wanted to include a copy of that false message in this e-mail but I figured out I might participate in distributing it (specially there is more than 30 people on this list)!!!! so I decided not to. Let's not allow our love of the prophet blind our eyes from what is right. He left us a complete message that does not need a dream to prove true. And as we discussed in our TGIJ once, if someone approach you and says somethig, specially if it is a hadith or saying the prophet said so and so, you have to ask and verify his source. wassalam Osama _____________________________________________________________________________ From: Suheil Laher <slaher@alum.mit.edu> wa`alaykum assalam Alright, lets just clear this up in case people start forwarding this en masse in panic. 1. It is authentically established that the Prophet (may Allah bless him and his Household and grant them peace) said that whoever sees him in a dream has indeed seen him, for Satan cannot impersonate him. Hence, if Sheik Ahmed really claims that he saw the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) in a dream, we will not refute him. However, the way it stands, we have no way of verifying even that. All we have is an anonymous message claiming that; we don't know from whom the message originated, whether the writer is a Muslim, and if so whether reliable and upright or not. At this point, I don't really know if the watchman of al-Masjid al-Nabawiyy is even named Sheik Ahmed. 2. The hadith talks about _seeing_ the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace), not about _hearing_. It is not inconceivable that one may see the Prophet in a dream, but that Satan may whisper something to the person, resulting in his thinking that the Prophet said it. 3. Even assuming that he claims to have heard the Prophet saying something, those words do not become binding because: 3.1 Firstly, one of the conditions for acceptance of hadith is DabT (precision in narrating) of the narrator. A sleeping person is not conscious, and is therefore not considered DabiT (precise/reliable) in what he reports from that state. Otherwise, what the dreamer reports would be a hadith, and the dreamer would be a Sahabi! 3.2 Even if, for the sake of argument, we say that he is DabiT in his narration, it still does not become binding, according to most scholars. Legislation was completed and perfected by the death of the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace). Hence, a dream cannot make something farD, or sunnah, or makruh, or Haram. Imam al-Nawawi has reported consensus (ijma`) on this. 4. So, if someone thinks he heard the Prophet tell him something in a dream, he is not obliged to follow it, although some considered that he may follow it himself, but that he cannot oblige others to follow it. All this is assuming that what he heard is in conformance with the shari`ah. If it conflicts with the shar`iah, there is no disagreement that it should be rejected as imaginings or Satanic whisperings, and neither he nor anyone else may act on it. 5. Having established these general principles, we now turn to the specific matter at hand. The things which this letter claims were advised by the Prophet in the dream (wives obeying their husbands, helping the poor, performance of pilgrimage, establishment of salah) are certainly good things, in conformance with the shari`ah. Hence, if someone wants to remind Muslims to do these good deeds, then inshaAllah there is reward for him in that. In fact, this would be the case even if there had been no such dream as that reported. 6. However, to make it a farD on Muslims to distribute 20 copies of the letter, and to say that they will be punished in this world if they do not do so is not a part of the shari`ah: i) According to the Qur'an and Sunnah, a person is not necessarily punished in this world for a sin. A Muslim may be punished in this world, in which case he is freed from punishment for it in the Hereafter. Or, Allah may forgive him in the Hereafter, or in fact even before that if he repents sincerely. Evil people may not be punished in this world, by way of istidraj (deception) - i.e. Allah gives them more and more luxury and comfort, so that they fall further and deeper into evil. ii) Rationally, it is not sound for one to be punished heavily for failing to distribute a letter, when one is not punished to the same extent for not making da`wah to non-Muslims by propagating the message of tawHeed and the Qur'an (which _is_ a farD for every Muslim living in a non-Muslim country). Admittedly, this second argument is only speculative, and not decisive. Attached below is an extract from Imam Nawawi's commentary on SaHeeH Muslim, for those who are interested in reading it, although I have already mentioned above most of the points he discusses. And Allah, the Flawless, knows best. Suheil ------------------- Translated from SharH SaHeeH Muslim, by Imam al-Nawawi. Text (C) by Suheil Laher Qadi `Iyad (may Allah have mercy upon him) said, ". . . . [It is] not that one can be certain of the matter of a dream, nor that an established sunnah can be invalidated on account of [a dream], nor that an unporved sunnah can be established [by it]. This is by the consensus of the scholars." These are the words of Qadi `Iyad, and the same has been said by others of our colleagues [the Shafi`is] and others [besides them]. They reported agreement that that which is established in the Law cannot be changed on account of that which the sleeping person sees. This, which we have mentioned, does not contradict the saying of [the Messenger of Allah] (may Allah bless him and grant him peace), "Whoever sees me in a dream has [indeed] seen me," for the meaning of the hadith is that his vision is authentic and not part of [mere] muddled dreams, nor of the deception of Satan. However, it is not permissible to establish a legal ruling by it, because the state of sleep is not one of retention and exactitude for that which the seer [of the dream] hears. [Scholars] have agreed that among the conditions [stipulated] for those whose narration and testimony may be accepted is that he be alert, not inattentive nor of poor memory, nor very error-prone, nor of impeded retention. The sleeping person does not have these characteristics, and so his narration is not accepted, because of the impariment of his retentive ability. All of this is with regard to a dream associated with initiation of a verdict in contradiction to that by which the people of authority judge. If, on the other hand, one saw the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) ordering one to do something which is recommended, or forbidding one to do something forbidden, or directing him to do something beneficial, then there is no disagreement over the praiseworthiness of acting by it, for that is not a verdict based merely on the dream, but rather on that which is established [in the Law] regarding the basis of that [deed]. And Allah knows best. |
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