Tasawuf ; Dhikr List

Why I accept 4 madhabs ?

Assalamu Allaikum

Bismillah ..alhamdullilah..wa'salathu wasalamu 3aa Resullilah Ama Ba'd

For many years, I used to believe that definite Madhabs were stupid thing. What I thought was ? How can you divide Islam into 4 ? and then say no other views are acceptable ? Rubbish.

I followed a literalist path where I made my own decision as to what I wanted to do based on "proofs'. These proof spanned simply the "Qu'ran and SAHEEEHH Hadith".

Many things made me change my mind. One of the main ones was an article about the "Problem of anti madhabism" by Shaykh Abdul Hakeem Murad. Another would be the divisions I saw among the litterelists themselves. For example , more than likely 2 people belonging to this group would prayer 2 different ways. Similar in a group of 100 of them, there might be 30 different ways of praying. Well thats exaggeration. Let's say 10.

Now I realized it was because the method used by these respected scholars was to quote Quran and Ahadith and well and away. It made sense to me... when I did not know anything. As a result I did know everything or I thought so...

When I first heard somebody talk about Madhabs and how they backed up by generations of scholars, the first thought that popped into my mind was "they have deviated from the original Imams'. Aozobillah and Astagfurrillah... I was "like" so wrong ....

On a particular website, you would find them quote the Imams of the 4 madhabs , and use it against Taqleed , which is to adhere to a Madhab. I admit, pretty strong.
Funnily enough , I was once listening to a revert to Islam who was a learned teacher in the literalist tradition. He spoke about how an Atheist would ask you "can god do everything" and you would say "yes" and then he would say "can god die ? " and you would say no. Azobillah.
And he would say you contradict yourself. Thus when you speak you speak in relation to a certain platform which he (the atheist) might not know how.

Similar when the Imams of the Madhabs (may Allah have mercy on them) said "IF anything is in the Quran and Sunnah, it is in my Madhab", the point was not to be taken literally. Rather it needs to be examined. While a scholastic explanation is needed, I prefer to think of it NOW, as being , yes , but you have to look at the sources, through the methodology of those Imams'. For example I believe the Malaki SCHOLARLY tradition takes a great emphasis on the consensus of the scholars of Medina during a certain time.

I also changed my definition of Madhabs. Rather than schools of thought or jurisprudence, I now see it more to be SCHOLARLY TRADITIONS. If my understanding is not wrong, yes an Imam establishes a Madhab, but the students , and the generations of students after them , who are the Ulema of the Ahlus Sunnah who really define and refine and propagate the opinions of these Madhabs.

My argument against myself for saying 4 madhabs is dividing is that, now rather than 4 from where I came from , I saw over a 1000 (not literally of course). Thus everybody was differrent. Now following a Madhab, especially at Masjid, it is beautiful ,and wallahi so beautiful when the person next to you, prayers EXACTLY LIKE YOU DO. ALhamdullilah , never before have I seen this.

Madhabs also give allowance for person choice. However now I understand. If Resullah (SAW), came with a message, we would not be able to question it no matter what. Similarly, why do we question the Madhabs. If we accept the Madhabs as being the interpretation of his message , then we cannot really say , I agree with this but not that. Because each one has a ORGANZED method and to say something is out of order is really wrong. However scholars make an exception , that is if you want to follow a stricter ruling. I found this very hard to follow once, but it makes sense. However how it makes sense , it depends on what the rulings are. Like for example in the case of wade, Hanafi fiqh teaches touching a female does not break your wudu. However my own preference would be if POSSIBLE , to retake wudu and this is allowed under the Shaf'ee madhab. Since I want to be safe rather than sorry and to purify my consciousness it would be better. However if it was the other way, it would be giving into being LAZY, pure lazy and nothing but lazy and no matter who did it , it would be true.

I also believe the harmonization of the 4 scholarly traditions is another aspect not seen .The respect, the tolerance the EVERYTHING... is wonderful. It makes faith so lovely , rather than discontent and wanting to pick on difference and faults especially because one has read the English translations of SAHEEEHH Hadith.

Another thing is the literalist made Islam so easy. I find myself laughing at myself. All those years I saw so many law books regarding common law, branching out into 50 areas, and yet Islam was a pamplet ? Astagfurillah. I now know Islam is complicated and difficult and we have to place trust in scholars. We cannot even go to defend ourselves against a traffic offense in court , as we don't know the law, and yet some of us know and have mastered the "truth".

I now know Hadith better than before which means I know I knew nothing before and a little now. I know that 3 types of Hadith exist , Saheeh , Hasad and Da'eff. In fact a fourth exist... Mutawatir.. say for example when a particular hadith is narrated by over 70 different narrators.

I also know that all 3 are taken into account, but the weighing is different. I also know that Hadith are of two parts. The first part is usually omitted is the chain of narrations. The chain of NARRATORS would determine if the Hadith is a basis in a madhabs. For example considering the age of the sahabah involved, his closeness to Resullah (SAW), his health etc. Another thing is Saheeh Bukharee and Saheeh Muslim would have different conditions. Imam Bukharee, for example under his conditions could have put Hadith that Imam Muslim took as Saheeh , into his (Imam Bukharee's) hasad hadith. May Allah have mercy upon the great Imams of our hadith collections and protect the collections of the evil slanders of those who twist and turn our traditions for political and religious benefit.

Thus now I realize I know , no Islam at all compared to how much I should be knowing. Thus Taqleed is important, as to avoid confusion. The other thing I believe is that the majority of the Ummah , and by this the majority of the Ulema, throughout history would never be wrong.

Literalism never suited by soul. It was more of a feel good thing. Now I realize if too feel good, you can never do. Because one must continuously be in a war against his desires and to purify his heart. I also accept tasawuf, something I saw as bidah. I trust scholars now, simply because now I realize i know nothing.

However I have full respect for those who want to be literals. However sometimes we find these people have the best vocalists (in making noise). However they are not fools and are blessed as well, alhamdullilah, and we should not ridicule them, but pray to Allah to improve our own selves and the entire Ummah.

Lastly, I also have an understanding of history of Christianity as it was something that I learned in school. Throughout the ages, when ever somebody introduced some idea claiming to "reform" the church(es), either for religious reasons (Calvinism) or political reasons (such as the Anglican Church) it branches out only to become another one, and this process would repeat itself on the original church or the sect church. For most religions divergence , occurs, but in the case of Islam, convergence occurred. Yes there were than 4 madhabs. But however only 4 served the test of time , and converged to what we call the Ahlus Sunnah Wal Jamath.
Look at the shia's for example. All respect to them. Barring the 12ers and the Zidiniya Shia, we have another 400 or so beliefs. Of course the majority of shia's classify them (the 400 or so) heretical. The point is their divergence was massive.

The 4 madhabs , I believe are better than the (unlimited it seemed) madness which I followed before.

"wa'salamu alaiikum warahamathulahi wabrakatu"

Peace, Love and Respect.

6th September 2008

Note: The following represents Hanafi fiqh but and should NOT be used a basis for Fiqh rulings.

Bismillah... Alhamdullilah ..wa'salaathu wasalamu 3ala Resullilah Ama Ba'd.

Peace and blessings be upon the beloved, his righteous family and his companions.

Last week we mainly covered the fiqh of fasting. I learned quite a bit of
new things which I did not know before. Some of the things we did , such
as the importance of fasting , verses pertaining to it I knew before hand.

According to the Fiqh we learned Fasting is mainly to abstain from 3
things. Eating and drinking, sexual intercourse and drinking of any kind
of medicine. Breaking your fast with these (and intentionally for eating
and drinking), means one has to pay back 60 days of kaffarah plus one day
wajib qadar PER FAST BROKEN.

kaffarah was a new concept done which I did not know about before.

Many other things broke the fast but did not render kaffarah but only the
wajib qadar. These were listed in our fiqh book.

Other things did not break the fast were also listed.

These things included vommiting involuntarily and eating and drinking unintentionally. being somebody prone to illness, I do find myself vomit at the most oddest of times, such as just
waking up, running outside and vommiting out of nowhere !.

Another new thing I learned was that , if one breaks his fast due to do
any condition intentionally or unintentionally , whether he requires kaffarah
or not to make up for it, by Islamic law, he still is not allowed to eat
or drink afterwards. His fast is not counted, but he is still not
permitted. I would assume at this point, that one would not be able to
have sexual intercourse as well.

This applies to females who have periods. If they did not wake up for
suhoor but then find out in the morning they are not in that state, they
still hav to fast, and then make wajib qadar later.

The applies if periods disappears after an afternoon nap.

So that was pretty much what I learned in the last class.

Furthur Research.

This is my own research into this topic to develop furthur understanding
from traditional sources.

• Kaffarah is universal across the 4 madhabs.
• I also found out that Salatul Ja'mah , is Sunnah Khifiyah in the Hanafimadhab and Fard Khifayah in the Sha'fee madhab.
• I also read that Imsak is practiced mainly in the the Hanafi tradition andit is not sinful to eat right up to fajr, if one can be precise about the time of fajr. However my Ustaiz said it is a precaution (like to inform people it's 10 minutes to fajr), and one can eat up to fajr anyway Hanafi or not.

My next planned articles are on my reflection of my acceptance of the 4 madhabs and also on Madrassah for the 12th of September.