What is the ruling on belonging to Islamic groups and being partisan to them?
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner : Your Eminence the Shaykh! What is the ruling on belonging to Islamic groups and being partisan to them? May Allah reward you with good.
The Shaykh : Belonging to Islamic groups that leads to division is forbidden, without doubt. Because Allah, Glorified and Exalted is He, said:
[Ash-Shuraa 42:13], and Allah the Exalted said to His Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him): [Al-An'am 6:159] [Al-An'am 6:159].
So it is obligatory for us to be one community, as Allah has commanded us to do. We enjoin what is right and forbid what is wrong, and we call to good. It is obligatory that if we disagree with someone and we see that he is mistaken, we advise him, clarify the truth to him, and call him to it. However, taking his error as a reason to publicize it, backbite him, or insult him is not permissible. If you reflect and look back at history, you will find that this division did not exist among the Companions. None of them said, "I am a Salafi," or "I am a reformer," or anything else attributed to the sects. They were all upon what came in the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him). We are all Quranic, we are all Sunnis, we are all Salafis.
But that does not mean that we should misguide the other groups if they agree with the goal we are upon, and it is never permissible for this partisanship to exist. And[Ar-Rum 30:32].
The questioner : Your Eminence the Shaykh! Would you please shed light on the biography of your Shaykh, the scholar Shaykh Abd al-Rahman ibn Nasir al-Sa'di (may Allah have mercy on him), and how he sought knowledge, as well as aspects of his scholarly biography and his works?
The Shaykh : This requires a long time, and it can be understood through the biographies written about him, because some of his printed books contain a biography of him. Yes, is that not so?
The Shaykh : Belonging to Islamic groups that leads to division is forbidden, without doubt. Because Allah, Glorified and Exalted is He, said:
He has ordained for you of religion what He enjoined upon Noah and that which We have revealed to you, [O Muhammad], and what We enjoined upon Abraham and Moses and Jesus - to establish the religion and not be divided therein.
شَرَعَ لَكُم مِّنَ الدِّينِ مَا وَصَّىٰ بِهِ نُوحًا وَالَّذِي أَوْحَيْنَا إِلَيْكَ وَمَا وَصَّيْنَا بِهِ إِبْرَاهِيمَ وَمُوسَىٰ وَعِيسَىٰ أَنْ أَقِيمُوا الدِّينَ وَلَا تَتَفَرَّقُوا فِيهِIndeed, those who have divided their religion and become sects - you, [O Muhammad], are not [associated] with them in anything. Their affair is only [left] to Allah
إِنَّ الَّذِينَ فَرَّقُوا دِينَهُمْ وَكَانُوا شِيَعًا لَّسْتَ مِنْهُمْ فِي شَيْءٍ إِنَّمَا أَمْرُهُمْ إِلَى اللَّهِthen He will inform them about what they used to do.
ثُمَّ يُنَبِّئُهُم بِمَا كَانُوا يَفْعَلُونَSo it is obligatory for us to be one community, as Allah has commanded us to do. We enjoin what is right and forbid what is wrong, and we call to good. It is obligatory that if we disagree with someone and we see that he is mistaken, we advise him, clarify the truth to him, and call him to it. However, taking his error as a reason to publicize it, backbite him, or insult him is not permissible. If you reflect and look back at history, you will find that this division did not exist among the Companions. None of them said, "I am a Salafi," or "I am a reformer," or anything else attributed to the sects. They were all upon what came in the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him). We are all Quranic, we are all Sunnis, we are all Salafis.
But that does not mean that we should misguide the other groups if they agree with the goal we are upon, and it is never permissible for this partisanship to exist. And
every faction rejoicing in what it has.
كُلُّ حِزْبٍ بِمَا لَدَيْهِمْ فَرِحُونَThe questioner : Your Eminence the Shaykh! Would you please shed light on the biography of your Shaykh, the scholar Shaykh Abd al-Rahman ibn Nasir al-Sa'di (may Allah have mercy on him), and how he sought knowledge, as well as aspects of his scholarly biography and his works?
The Shaykh : This requires a long time, and it can be understood through the biographies written about him, because some of his printed books contain a biography of him. Yes, is that not so?
Source
لقاء بمسجد الطلاب بالمدينة الجامعية - 1 — archive.org (45:13)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.