The Ruling on Befriending a Disbeliever to Learn His Language
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner:
What should I do with a foreign disbeliever friend whom I sit with to learn his language, given that he insists I respect his religion, customs, and traditions when I am with him, even if those customs and traditions are things Allah has forbidden? Should I sit with him for the benefit, or should I cut off contact with him?
The Shaykh:
It is not permissible to take a friend from among the disbelievers on the pretext that you are learning from him, because he may influence you, or he may invite you to his religion and make his religion appealing to you, or at the very least, you may be pleased with his state of disbelief and sins and not condemn it. The matter of learning has other avenues.
Praise be to Allah. Now, schools are open, and they have foreign languages with teachers using regulated and safe methods. So you can learn the language in schools and from the teachers who were brought in for this purpose and who are monitored and followed up on.
As for an ordinary disbeliever who has no responsibility or supervision, and you are alone with him, and he openly displays disbelief and atheism and says, "Respect what I am upon." This is not permissible. This is a great danger, even if you do not learn the language. Learning a foreign language is not a necessity. If learning a foreign language is only at the expense of your religion, compromising your religion, this is not permissible. Yes.
The questioner:
Honorable Shaykh, what are the sins that, if a person persists in them, his heart becomes sealed?
The Shaykh:
And the obligatory is to complete the answer to the previous question. The obligatory is the opposite: the disbeliever must respect our religion as long as he is in our lands. The obligatory, and the system as well, is that he did not enter the country except on the condition that he respects the religion of Islam. The obligatory is the opposite: it is he who respects our religion and does not display anything of disbelief or atheism in the lands of the Muslims. Yes, is this the question?
What should I do with a foreign disbeliever friend whom I sit with to learn his language, given that he insists I respect his religion, customs, and traditions when I am with him, even if those customs and traditions are things Allah has forbidden? Should I sit with him for the benefit, or should I cut off contact with him?
The Shaykh:
It is not permissible to take a friend from among the disbelievers on the pretext that you are learning from him, because he may influence you, or he may invite you to his religion and make his religion appealing to you, or at the very least, you may be pleased with his state of disbelief and sins and not condemn it. The matter of learning has other avenues.
Praise be to Allah. Now, schools are open, and they have foreign languages with teachers using regulated and safe methods. So you can learn the language in schools and from the teachers who were brought in for this purpose and who are monitored and followed up on.
As for an ordinary disbeliever who has no responsibility or supervision, and you are alone with him, and he openly displays disbelief and atheism and says, "Respect what I am upon." This is not permissible. This is a great danger, even if you do not learn the language. Learning a foreign language is not a necessity. If learning a foreign language is only at the expense of your religion, compromising your religion, this is not permissible. Yes.
The questioner:
Honorable Shaykh, what are the sins that, if a person persists in them, his heart becomes sealed?
The Shaykh:
And the obligatory is to complete the answer to the previous question. The obligatory is the opposite: the disbeliever must respect our religion as long as he is in our lands. The obligatory, and the system as well, is that he did not enter the country except on the condition that he respects the religion of Islam. The obligatory is the opposite: it is he who respects our religion and does not display anything of disbelief or atheism in the lands of the Muslims. Yes, is this the question?
Source
قناة «العلامة الدكتور صالح الفوزان»، محاضرات في العقيدة والدعوة-030-الشباب والاستهزاء بالدين|صالح الفوزان|كبار العلماء — youtube.com (40:10)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.