Comparing Scholars: One of the Manners of a Student of Knowledge
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success. A questioner says: Is it among the manners of a student of knowledge to compare scholars, saying that so-and-so is better than so-and-so, and so on?
Answer:
No, that is not appropriate. What is appropriate is that he compares between them, saying, "So-and-so is better; so-and-so has a virtue; so-and-so is a scholar whom Allah has granted knowledge," without mentioning the others and saying, "He is better than so-and-so or so-and-so." Yes.
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success. A questioner says: Is it among the manners of a student of knowledge to compare scholars, saying that so-and-so is better than so-and-so, and so on?
Answer:
No, that is not appropriate. What is appropriate is that he compares between them, saying, "So-and-so is better; so-and-so has a virtue; so-and-so is a scholar whom Allah has granted knowledge," without mentioning the others and saying, "He is better than so-and-so or so-and-so." Yes.
Source
شرح إغاثة اللهفان من مصائد الشيطان لابن القيم، فصل وأما تسميته بالسمود — islamhouse.com (54:28)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.