Combining the Preference of the Messengers with the Hadith "Do Not Prefer Us Over Yunus"
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success, a questioner says: Regarding the saying of Allah the Exalted[Al-Baqarah 2:253] and the report from the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) that he said , how do you reconcile these two?
The Shaykh:
If the preference is in the sense of boasting, then it is not permissible. But if the preference is in the sense of acknowledging the favor of Allah, then there is no harm. Our Prophet is the best of the prophets and messengers (peace and blessings be upon him), and some of the messengers are better than others. This is the favor of Allah, which He grants to whom He wills. If it is in the sense of boasting, it is not permissible. If it is in the sense of acknowledging the favor and the blessing of Allah, then there is no harm.
The presenter:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success, is it permissible to follow in prayer a person who joined the prayer late?
The Shaykh:
If the intention, meaning the intention of the previous question, is to boast about this and belittle the one who is less preferred, then it is not permissible. If the intention is to belittle the one who is less preferred, then it is not permissible. Yes.
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success, a questioner says: Regarding the saying of Allah the Exalted
Those messengers - some of them We caused to exceed others.
تِلْكَ الرُّسُلُ فَضَّلْنَا بَعْضَهُمْ عَلَىٰ بَعْضٍDo not prefer us over Yunus ibn Matta
لا تفضلوني على يونس بن متىThe Shaykh:
If the preference is in the sense of boasting, then it is not permissible. But if the preference is in the sense of acknowledging the favor of Allah, then there is no harm. Our Prophet is the best of the prophets and messengers (peace and blessings be upon him), and some of the messengers are better than others. This is the favor of Allah, which He grants to whom He wills. If it is in the sense of boasting, it is not permissible. If it is in the sense of acknowledging the favor and the blessing of Allah, then there is no harm.
The presenter:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success, is it permissible to follow in prayer a person who joined the prayer late?
The Shaykh:
If the intention, meaning the intention of the previous question, is to boast about this and belittle the one who is less preferred, then it is not permissible. If the intention is to belittle the one who is less preferred, then it is not permissible. Yes.
Source
شرح إغاثة اللهفان من مصائد الشيطان لابن القيم، فصل وإذا تدبرت الشريعة وجدتها قد أتت بسد الذرائع إلى المحرمات — islamhouse.com (1:10:03)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.