Knowing the open sinfulness of one whose status is unknown when accepting his report
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
Allah the Exalted said:[Al-Hujurat 49:6] The questioner asks: If a person comes to me whom I do not know at all, how do I know whether he is an open sinner or not, so that I may accept his report or reject it?
Answer:
The default for a Muslim is integrity, and one should hold the best opinion of him, unless you know that he is an open sinner, in which case you do not accept his report. As for what you do not know, the default is integrity, and one should hold the best opinion of the Muslim.
Allah the Exalted said:
O you who have believed, if there comes to you a disobedient one with information, investigate, lest you harm a people out of ignorance
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِن جَاءَكُمْ فَاسِقٌ بِنَبَإٍ فَتَبَيَّنُوا أَن تُصِيبُوا قَوْمًا بِجَهَالَةٍAnswer:
The default for a Muslim is integrity, and one should hold the best opinion of him, unless you know that he is an open sinner, in which case you do not accept his report. As for what you do not know, the default is integrity, and one should hold the best opinion of the Muslim.
Source
لقاء مع المعلمين بالطائف 1434هـ — alfawzan.live (33:13)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.