The Ruling on Muslims Building Churches
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
A questioner says: I have a difficulty with your answer regarding the building of churches. Is the disbelief tied to the mere act, or is it conditional on holding a belief in that?
Answer:
My brother, it is not permissible for Muslims to build churches, because they are places of worship for disbelievers, and we do not assist disbelievers; we do not build churches for them. However, if they enter under the rule of Islam, if they enter into the covenant and pay the jizyah (tax on protected non-Muslims) to the Muslims, then they are left with what they have of churches, but they do not establish anything new; they are left with only what exists. And if something collapses, they do not rebuild it; they are not permitted to rebuild it, but they are left with only the existing churches. We do not raise them, nor do we renovate them, nor do we help them with them, because they are places of obligation of disbelief where they say, "Allah is the third of three," and they say, "The Messiah is the son of Allah." They have beliefs in which they worship the cross, which they claim is in the image of 'Isa, and he is crucified, and they are distressed in that. We do not enable them to do this, nor do we build churches for them. Even in their lands, if they enter under the covenant, we do not enable them to establish new churches; we only leave them with what exists. Yes.
The presenter:
May Allah reward you,
A questioner says: I have a difficulty with your answer regarding the building of churches. Is the disbelief tied to the mere act, or is it conditional on holding a belief in that?
Answer:
My brother, it is not permissible for Muslims to build churches, because they are places of worship for disbelievers, and we do not assist disbelievers; we do not build churches for them. However, if they enter under the rule of Islam, if they enter into the covenant and pay the jizyah (tax on protected non-Muslims) to the Muslims, then they are left with what they have of churches, but they do not establish anything new; they are left with only what exists. And if something collapses, they do not rebuild it; they are not permitted to rebuild it, but they are left with only the existing churches. We do not raise them, nor do we renovate them, nor do we help them with them, because they are places of obligation of disbelief where they say, "Allah is the third of three," and they say, "The Messiah is the son of Allah." They have beliefs in which they worship the cross, which they claim is in the image of 'Isa, and he is crucified, and they are distressed in that. We do not enable them to do this, nor do we build churches for them. Even in their lands, if they enter under the covenant, we do not enable them to establish new churches; we only leave them with what exists. Yes.
The presenter:
May Allah reward you,
Source
شرح نواقض الإسلام [ صالح الفوزان ]، بداية من الناقض الخامس : من أبغض شيئًا مما جاء به الرسول - صلى الله عليه وسلم - ولو عمل به؛ كفر — islamhouse.com (9:13)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.