The Ruling on Categorizing Muslims
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner:
I ask Allah for your sake. I have a question: It is observed, Your Excellency the Shaykh, that people are falling into categorization these days, to the point that people are repelled from the truth. What is your guidance (may Allah preserve you)?
The Shaykh:
What is categorization?
The questioner:
He writes: "He is a Salafi."
The Shaykh:
Categorization.
The questioner:
This kind of categorization: this one is a Salafi, this one is a Sufi, this one is a Muslim Brotherhood member, and so on.
The Shaykh:
What divides Muslims and causes fitnah (trial, discord or temptation) is not permissible. If you have an observation about someone, you should advise him between you and him, or write to him between you and him. As for preoccupied with the faults of people and in gatherings, this does not benefit anything, and this increases evil. Yes.
I ask Allah for your sake. I have a question: It is observed, Your Excellency the Shaykh, that people are falling into categorization these days, to the point that people are repelled from the truth. What is your guidance (may Allah preserve you)?
The Shaykh:
What is categorization?
The questioner:
He writes: "He is a Salafi."
The Shaykh:
Categorization.
The questioner:
This kind of categorization: this one is a Salafi, this one is a Sufi, this one is a Muslim Brotherhood member, and so on.
The Shaykh:
What divides Muslims and causes fitnah (trial, discord or temptation) is not permissible. If you have an observation about someone, you should advise him between you and him, or write to him between you and him. As for preoccupied with the faults of people and in gatherings, this does not benefit anything, and this increases evil. Yes.
Source
75-لقاءات مع الشيخ صالح الفوزان - 03----13-4-1432 — archive.org (45:22)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.