The Difference Between Backbiting and Talebearing
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
The questioner asks: What is the difference between backbiting and talebearing, and we would like to be alerted to the error in what?
Answer:
Backbiting is mentioning your brother with what he dislikes while he is absent, as the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said. As for talebearing, it is conveying speech between people with the intent of causing corruption between them. This is talebearing. Backbiting and talebearing are two great crimes because of the corruption and ruin they contain.
Allah (Exalted and Majestic is He) said:[Al-Hujurat 49:12] the Accepter of Repentance, the Merciful. And regarding talebearing, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: Sahih Muslim 105a and in another narration: Sahih Muslim 105b and he is the talebearer. [Al-Qalam 68:10-11] The danger of talebearing is great; it corrupts relations between people, and it is a type of sorcery because it affects hatred in hearts just as sorcery affects lovers. For this reason, they said: The talebearer corrupts in an hour what the sorcerer corrupts in a year. Yes.
The questioner asks: What is the difference between backbiting and talebearing, and we would like to be alerted to the error in what?
Answer:
Backbiting is mentioning your brother with what he dislikes while he is absent, as the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said. As for talebearing, it is conveying speech between people with the intent of causing corruption between them. This is talebearing. Backbiting and talebearing are two great crimes because of the corruption and ruin they contain.
Allah (Exalted and Majestic is He) said:
or backbite each other. Would one of you like to eat the flesh of his brother when dead? You would detest it. And fear Allah; indeed, Allah
وَلَا يَغْتَب بَّعْضُكُم بَعْضًا أَيُحِبُّ أَحَدُكُمْ أَن يَأْكُلَ لَحْمَ أَخِيهِ مَيْتًا فَكَرِهْتُمُوهُ وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ إِنَّ اللَّهَThe tale-bearer shall not enter Paradise.
لا يدخل الجنة نمامThe beater of false tales would never enter heaven.
لا يدخل الجنة قتات(10) And do not obey every worthless habitual swearer (11) [And] scorner, going about with malicious gossip -
وَلَا تُطِعْ كُلَّ حَلَّافٍ مَّهِينٍ هَمَّازٍ مَّشَّاءٍ بِنَمِيمٍ
Source
75-لقاءات مع الشيخ صالح الفوزان - 07- — archive.org (35:18)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.