The Hanbalis’ exclusion of the crocodile and the frog from sea creatures
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah preserve you, the principle is that all sea creatures are lawful, so why did the Hanbalis, may Allah have mercy on them, exclude the crocodile and the frog, and the hadith is a proof against them?
The Shaykh:
They excluded them because of reasons they saw in them. They said that the frog resembles the land snake, so it is among the abominable things. This is their reasoning, but it is not correct. It is actually lawful because it is a sea creature. As for the crocodile, they said that it is a predator, so it falls under the prohibition of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) regarding every fanged predator, because it is a predator that devours, and it also lives on land; it lives on land and in the sea, so its life is not restricted to the sea alone.
The questioner:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah preserve you.
The Shaykh:
I do not think anyone eats crocodile. I do not think anyone ever eats crocodile. Yes.
The questioner:
Yes.
The Shaykh:
Predation is not its nature. And even if it were said that it is a predator, the generality of the saying of Allah the Exalted[Al-Ma'idah 5:96] makes it lawful. Yes.
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah preserve you, the principle is that all sea creatures are lawful, so why did the Hanbalis, may Allah have mercy on them, exclude the crocodile and the frog, and the hadith is a proof against them?
The Shaykh:
They excluded them because of reasons they saw in them. They said that the frog resembles the land snake, so it is among the abominable things. This is their reasoning, but it is not correct. It is actually lawful because it is a sea creature. As for the crocodile, they said that it is a predator, so it falls under the prohibition of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) regarding every fanged predator, because it is a predator that devours, and it also lives on land; it lives on land and in the sea, so its life is not restricted to the sea alone.
The questioner:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah preserve you.
The Shaykh:
I do not think anyone eats crocodile. I do not think anyone ever eats crocodile. Yes.
The questioner:
Yes.
The Shaykh:
Predation is not its nature. And even if it were said that it is a predator, the generality of the saying of Allah the Exalted
Lawful to you is game from the sea
أُحِلَّ لَكُمْ صَيْدُ الْبَحْرِ
Source
قناة «العلامة الدكتور صالح الفوزان»، 63 من 89|شرح العدة في شرح العمدة|كتاب الأطعمة|صالح الفوزان|الفقه|كبار العلماء — youtube.com (1:07:56)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.