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﴿ فَاسْأَلُوا أَهْلَ الذِّكْرِ إِن كُنتُمْ لَا تَعْلَمُونَ ﴾

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Chapter: "Chapter on Cursing the Disbeliever." Explanation of the hadith of Abu Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him): (It was said, "O Messenger of Allah, call upon Allah against the polytheists")

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The Shaykh : As for this chapter, he cited in it one authentic hadith with its chain of narration.
From Abu Hurayrah, who said:
The Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, was asked, "Messenger of Allah, invoke a curse for us against the idolaters.' He replied, 'I was not sent as a curser. I was sent as a mercy.'" قيل يا رسول الله ادع الله على المشركين ، قال : إني لم أبعث لعّانًا ولكن بعثت رحمة
Al-Adab Al-Mufrad 321
.
The author (may Allah have mercy on him) titled this hadith with a title that does not specify the ruling on cursing the disbeliever, because he said: "Chapter on Cursing the Disbeliever", he did not say "Chapter on the Permissibility of Cursing the Disbeliever" or "Chapter on the Impermissibility of Cursing the Disbeliever." This is because, first, there is scholarly disagreement on the issue, and second, as mentioned in a previous lesson, the principle is that a Muslim should not habituate his tongue to cursing others, even if it is Iblis the accursed. In my opinion, this hadith was among the effects of the Lord of the Worlds disciplining His noble Prophet. It is reported in the two Sahihs from the hadith of Anas and others:
That the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) once sent a secret mission containing a select group of the noblest of the Companions. When they came to one of the tribes, they gave them safe conduct, but then they treacherously attacked them and killed seventy Companions from the noblest of the Messenger's (peace be upon him) Companions and from their reciters and memorizers of the Noble Qur'an. When the news of them reached the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), he was grieved with intense grief until Anas ibn Malik said: "I did not see the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) become angry about anything— meaning he was grieved about anything— as he was grieved about those Companions" أن النبي صلى الله عليه وآله وسلم كان أرسل مرة سرية فيها نخبة من أفاضل الصحابة فلما أتوا قبيلة من القبائل أَمَّنوهم ثم غدروا بهم فقتلوا منهم سبعين صحابياً من أفاضل أصحاب الرسول عليه السلام ومن قرآئهم وحفاظ القرآن الكريم ، فلما بلغ خبرهم رسول الله صلى الله عليه وآله وسلم حزن حزناً شديداً حتى قال أنس بن مالك : ما رأيت رسول الله صلى الله عليه وآله وسلم وجد على شيء : -أي حزن على شيء- وجده على أولئك الصحابة
: And the Prophet's (peace and blessings be upon him) grief over those Companions was for two reasons:
The first reason: They were, as we mentioned, among the most devout of the Companions and among their reciters.
The second reason: They were killed by treachery; they were not killed while facing the enemy face to face, but those disbelievers treacherously attacked them. Therefore, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) was grieved and was deeply sad for them, so he used to invoke against them and curse them in every prayer of the five daily prayers until the words of Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) in the Noble Qur'an were revealed— the verse has slipped from my mind— and the meaning is that those whom you are invoking against, it is not your duty to guide them, but Allah (Mighty and Majestic) may guide them. This is the meaning of the verse, and perhaps I will mention it later. Then, by the wisdom of Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He), after the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) had made the qunut supplication against those people for a full month and that verse was revealed, the people returned as Muslims. So the secret of the revelation of the verse to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) became apparent, as if he did not want him (may Allah's prayers and peace be upon him) to continue invoking against them and cursing them. The result was that those people whom the Messenger (peace be upon him) was cursing returned as Muslims. Here, the secret lies in the fact that it is not permissible, or at least it is not recommended, for a Muslim to curse a specific disbeliever, due to the possibility that he may return to Islam, and another possibility is that his Islam may become better than the Islam of the Muslim who inherited his Islam from his fathers and grandfathers. So it appears, and Allah knows best, that this hadith was after Allah (Mighty and Majestic) disciplined His Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) with that discipline, where He forbade him to continue and persist in cursing those disbelievers. So when it was requested of him (peace and blessings be upon him) to curse the disbelievers, his answer in this hadith was:
I have not been sent as the invoker of curse, but I have been sent as mercy. لم أبعث لعّانًا وإنما بعثت رحمة
Sahih Muslim 2599
So he (peace and blessings be upon him) in this hadith wants to combine the word with the deed and the deed with the word. Just as his call (peace and blessings be upon him) is a mercy, as He (Mighty and Majestic) said:
And We have not sent you, [O Muhammad], except as a mercy to the worlds. وما أرسلناك إلا رحمة للعالمين
[Al-Anbya 21:107]
meaning: by his call to His Shari'ah, so he wants to be merciful with people even in his speech. He does not curse even the polytheists who oppose Allah and the Messenger; he does not curse them because, first: cursing has little benefit. And second: as we mentioned previously, it is possible that these disbelievers may return to Islam. And we all know that all the Companions who believed in the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) were disbelievers, they were polytheists, and among them were those who opposed him (peace and blessings be upon him) with the most intense opposition, such as 'Umar ibn al-Khattab, for example. Nevertheless, he later became one of the greatest and strongest of people in faith after Abu Bakr al-Siddiq (may Allah be pleased with him).
If the Messenger (peace be upon him) had turned and made his habit cursing the disbelievers and cursing the polytheists who were opposing him, a contradiction would have appeared in the end: these are the ones he is cursing, and then they become Muslim believers. So the good conduct of the Messenger (peace be upon him) with people required that he not use the word "curse" even with those disbelievers who deserve to be cursed.
And here we say, as the Lord of the Worlds said:
There has certainly been for you in the Messenger of Allah an excellent pattern لقد كان لكم في رسول الله أُسوةٌ حسنة
[Al-Ahzab 33:21]
: That is because if the Messenger (peace be upon him) legislates for us in this hadith not to curse the polytheist disbelievers, then it is even more so and more so that we should not curse a Muslim, even if he is a sinner.
And this, as we said in the previous part of the lesson, means establishing a rule and a conduct for the Muslim to follow and walk upon. But sometimes, as we mentioned, a person may get angry and a word like "curse" or something similar may slip from his tongue, and no one is protected from this. But the perfect man, as he (peace be upon him) said, realizes his saying (peace be upon him):
and follow an evil deed with a good one to wipe it out, and treat the people with good behavior. وأتبع السيئة الحسنة تمحها ، وخالق الناس بخلق حسن
Jami` at-Tirmidhi 1987Hasan (Darussalam)
So if one of the people falls into such a slip in cursing one who does not deserve to be cursed, as I heard in the previous lesson about the story of Abu Bakr al-Siddiq (may Allah be pleased with him), where he cursed a slave boy of his, and the result of that was that he freed some of his slaves. So it is obligatory for us to habituate ourselves not to speak except with good, as he (peace be upon him) said:
And whoever believes in Allah and the Last Day, then let him say what is good or remain silent. ومن كان يؤمن بالله واليوم الآخر فليقل خيرًا أو ليصمت
Jami` at-Tirmidhi 2500Sahih (Darussalam)
.
Source alathar.net

The Arabic text is copied verbatim from the original source, without any edits.

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