What is your opinion on hiring a mutawwif to guide a person performing 'Umrah or Hajj?

The questioner : All right, I will ask. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. Praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds, and may peace and blessings be upon the noblest of the prophets and messengers. A questioner says: Honorable Shaykh, may Allah’s peace, mercy, and blessings be upon you. May Allah’s peace, mercy, and blessings be upon you. What is your opinion on hiring a mutawwif to guide a person performing 'Umrah or Hajj?

The Shaykh : The mutawwif. He is a guide and a show-er of the way. He guides people on how to do things, and shows them what to say and what to do. Therefore, he should possess a degree of fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence) and a degree of trustworthiness. Not everyone who guides and shows the way is qualified to be a mutawwif; rather, he must have a degree of fiqh and trustworthiness, so that he does not mislead them, whether out of ignorance or intentionally. He should also not make a condition regarding the work; he should not make a condition regarding the work, meaning he should not say, "I will not perform tawaf except for such and such." Rather, he performs tawaf, and if he is given something, he takes it, and if he is not given anything, he does not ask for it, because he is a guide, a show-er of the way, and a teacher. On this occasion, I see many pilgrims holding booklets containing supplications. . A supplication for the first lap, a supplication for the second, and a supplication for the third and fourth, and so on. I even heard a man the day before yesterday say, "O Allah, make it an accepted Hajj." And the pilgrim, by Allah, did not come for an accepted Hajj. So I stopped the pilgrim and said, "Come, my brother, are you a pilgrim performing Hajj or 'Umrah?" He said, "No, 'Umrah." He was stunned. I said, "Look, how are you a pilgrim performing Hajj now, because you are saying, 'O Allah, make it an accepted Hajj'?" But it seems he has become a jurist. He did not read that 'Umrah is the lesser Hajj. Yes, he said, "No, by Allah, I have not performed Hajj; this is 'Umrah." I said, "My brother, correct the phrase." So I asked the mutawwif, "How do you tell people, 'O Allah, make it an accepted Hajj,' when they have not performed Hajj?" He said, "They will perform Hajj, if Allah wills." I said, "If they perform Hajj, then say, 'O Allah, make it an accepted Hajj.' But today, do not say 'accepted Hajj'; that is a mistake." So I said, "My brother, say, 'O Allah, make it an accepted 'Umrah.'" So, praise be to Allah, he did. He said, "O Allah, make his 'Umrah accepted," and they followed him. This is a problem; if the mutawwif is ignorant and does not know, it is a problem. These booklets contain supplications for every lap; every lap has a supplication. That is why you find some of them, when the area around the Ka'bah becomes crowded, finishing their supplication before they reach the Yemeni Corner. What do they do? If they are jurists, they start over from the beginning. If they are not jurists, they remain silent. They remain silent and continue tawaf without supplication. The problem is if they reach the Yemeni Corner before finishing the lap, if the area is wide, meaning there is no crowding, and they reach the Yemeni Corner before finishing the supplication, what do they do? They stop, even in the middle of a word. If he says, "O Allah, grant me Paradise," and he reaches the Yemeni Corner at the point of saying, "O Allah, grant me... Paradise," why? Because the lap is finished, and it is not possible to bring a supplication that exceeds the lap. Therefore, I see it is obligatory for students of knowledge to alert people to this matter. It is said, "My brother, you are now reading from a book without knowing its meaning. Some of them do not even know the meaning. Perhaps they distort the words, and at the very least, at best, they do not know the meaning." We say, "You are not to supplicate with something whose meaning you do not know." And these words are not Qur'an, which you worship by reciting. You ask Allah for whatever you wish, but He will answer you easily. He says, "I do not know the supplication." What do you say? He says, "My brother, if you do not know, say, 'O Allah, I ask You for Paradise and I seek refuge in You from the Fire.'" Yes, he does not know. Everyone knows this. Repeat it. If you repeat it a hundred times in one lap, there is no harm. Say, "O Allah, I ask You for Paradise and I seek refuge in You from the Fire." And what do all the people who supplicate to Allah and worship Allah want? To enter Paradise and be saved from the Fire. We ask Allah to grant this to us all. All people in their worship and supplications want to enter Paradise and be saved from the Fire. If people were encouraged to do this, it would be good. In the Sa'y, when he ascends al-Safa, he reads Seven times, even though the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) did not read it on al-Safa or on al-Marwah, not even once. Did he read it on al-Safa and al-Marwah, not even once? Is that right or not? Yes. Say, "Is it right or not?" Is it correct? Jabir (may Allah be pleased with him) said, "When he approached al-Safa, he read 'I begin with what Allah began with.'" He did not say, "When he ascended al-Safa." When he approached, and approaching a thing is not ascending it. Approaching a thing is not ascending it. Meaning, when he approached al-Safa, meaning he came near it, he read the verse to make it clear to people. Why did he proceed to al-Safa before al-Marwah? To make it clear that he did so in obedience to the command of Allah only. Therefore, he said, "Begin with what Allah began with." Do you see, my brother? So, is it prescribed for me to read this verse while I am on top of al-Safa? No. When do I read it? When I approach al-Safa. And in every lap, or only in the first lap? Only in the first lap. So I tell you, my brothers, this is one of the mistakes in these booklets. There is another confusion. It tells you: The Stone of Ismail. The Stone of Ismail, Ismail ibn Ibrahim. And it is believed that this stone is his stone. And what does the one who hears this phrase think? That Ismail is the one who built it. It is not so. Who built it? Quraysh built it when they built the Ka'bah. The funds were insufficient; they did not have enough funds. So they said, "What shall we do?" They saw that they should cut off a part of the Ka'bah that they were building and build the rest that they could afford. And they surrounded the remaining part with a wall, enclosing it with a wall, so it was called al-Hajar (the Stone). Therefore, you will not find in the speech of the Salaf, nor in the Sunnah, neither in the Sunnah nor in the speech of the Salaf, the naming of this as "the Stone of Ismail" at all. But the mistake of the common people is a problem. The common people come and say, "This is not the Hajj of Ismail." Ismail did not know about it, and Ismail did not know except that the entire Ka'bah was built, because the foundations of Ibrahim encompass more of the Stone. So this is also one of the mistakes. Therefore, it is recommended for students of knowledge to clarify such matters to people, but with gentleness and softness.

The questioner : Honorable Shaykh, what is the ruling on placing sandals in the place of prostration?

The Shaykh : All right, the summary of the answer to the question is that there is no harm in the mutawwif taking what is given to him, but it is obligatory that his guiding of the pilgrims and those performing 'Umrah be based on the Shari'ah, and he must be trustworthy.