The Ruling on One Who Deliberately Abandons Prayer and the Fear of Sorcery
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner:
We only judge by appearances. So, if one engages in shirk (associating partners with Allah) and commits major shirk, we rule that he is a mushrik (one who associates partners with Allah) and treat him as the mushrikin (those who associate partners with Allah) are treated. However, if he has an excuse between him and Allah, then Allah is the One who takes charge of him, and his affair is left to Allah. Likewise, what is the ruling regarding one who dies while not praying?
The Shaykh:
Like the mushrik who dies while not praying, deliberately abandoning the prayer. This person is not treated as a mushrik, because he is a murtadd (apostate) from the religion of Islam, for deliberately abandoning the prayer is riddah (apostasy) from the religion of Islam. And if he dies in that state, he is not a Muslim.
The questioner:
If it is sufficient.
The Shaykh:
There is no distinction in the correct view, whether it is due to laziness or denial of its obligation. The correct opinion is that no distinction is made in this matter; that one who deliberately abandons the prayer and persists in it is declared a kafir (disbeliever), based on many proofs from the Book and the Sunnah. Some scholars made a distinction, and they are the majority. They said that if he denies its obligation, he is a kafir, but if he abandons it out of laziness, this is interpreted as [he] is killed, but it is from the category of hudud (fixed Qur'anic punishments), not from the category of kufr (disbelief). However, this opinion is the weaker one in reality, because the proofs indicate the kufr of one who abandons the prayer without distinction.
We only judge by appearances. So, if one engages in shirk (associating partners with Allah) and commits major shirk, we rule that he is a mushrik (one who associates partners with Allah) and treat him as the mushrikin (those who associate partners with Allah) are treated. However, if he has an excuse between him and Allah, then Allah is the One who takes charge of him, and his affair is left to Allah. Likewise, what is the ruling regarding one who dies while not praying?
The Shaykh:
Like the mushrik who dies while not praying, deliberately abandoning the prayer. This person is not treated as a mushrik, because he is a murtadd (apostate) from the religion of Islam, for deliberately abandoning the prayer is riddah (apostasy) from the religion of Islam. And if he dies in that state, he is not a Muslim.
The questioner:
If it is sufficient.
The Shaykh:
There is no distinction in the correct view, whether it is due to laziness or denial of its obligation. The correct opinion is that no distinction is made in this matter; that one who deliberately abandons the prayer and persists in it is declared a kafir (disbeliever), based on many proofs from the Book and the Sunnah. Some scholars made a distinction, and they are the majority. They said that if he denies its obligation, he is a kafir, but if he abandons it out of laziness, this is interpreted as [he] is killed, but it is from the category of hudud (fixed Qur'anic punishments), not from the category of kufr (disbelief). However, this opinion is the weaker one in reality, because the proofs indicate the kufr of one who abandons the prayer without distinction.
Source
الفوزان -أشرطة- أسئلة وأجوبة من دروس التوحيد - الفوزان - أسئلة التوحيد - 02 — archive.org (24:08)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.