What is your opinion of one who claims that the Salafi call is a call to the oneness of Allah, and that it cannot stand as it should in reality except with political support?
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The questioner : There are those who claim that the Salafi call is a call to the oneness of Allah, and that it cannot stand as it should in reality except with political support, and that reality confirms this, as is the case with the call of Shaykh Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab. What is your opinion?
The Shaykh : We say, we are sorry for these people who think they are doing well by engaging in political work, while they have not yet corrected their creed, nor understood the oneness of their Lord. We say to them: The Salafi call, in its various names that I mentioned earlier, means understanding Islam in a general and comprehensive way in all its rulings. It is not limited to the oneness of Allah, nor to what is broader than that in the circle of creeds as defined by scholars, nor is it limited to acts of worship, nor morals, nor transactions. Rather, it relates to understanding Islam from its two pure sources: the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), with a very important addition, which is according to the methodology of the righteous Salaf (may Allah be pleased with them). We have all worked within the limits of our ability—Zayd, Bakr, 'Amr, and so on—each working within the limits of his ability to clarify this Islam from all its aspects. One individual may not be able to undertake explaining Islam from all its aspects, but it is obligatory for the Ummah, for the Ummah as a whole, or in other words, for the specialists of the Ummah, or for the scholars truly, for them to undertake explaining Islam in light of the Book and the Sunnah and the methodology of the righteous Salaf. This is the call. As for if a person among us, for example, only corrects authentic hadiths and weakens weak hadiths, this does not mean he is not doing other work, but his other work may be less than that, or close to it. Similarly, if another man derives rulings from the Book of Allah alone, another from the hadiths of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) alone, and a third from the combination of both sources, the Book and the Sunnah, but he is not able, for example, to authenticate or weaken, we do not criticize him for not doing the work of that other person, nor do we speak of him because he is not doing the work of the first or the third, and so on. Rather, it is obligatory for this group of scholars to work toward making the entire Muslim Ummah understand Islam with the correct understanding, with the aforementioned condition.
When there is a group that rises to this duty of clarification according to the aforementioned methodology, then the believers will rejoice in the victory of Allah. Do we want to engage in political work, even if we took a leader of a group who engages in political work and claims that he works for Islam and for establishing the state of Islam? If we asked him: What is the oneness of lordship? What is the oneness of worship? What is the oneness of attributes? Perhaps it would be as the old Arabic proverb says: "He is more confused than one who is looking for a goat", meaning he is at the utmost inability to answer this question, which relates to the first testimony, from which a disbeliever does not escape except by acknowledging it, from the sword of Islam first, and then he does not escape from eternal abode in the Fire except if he first understands its meaning correctly, in detail as referred to earlier, which includes that "La ilaha illa Allah" means: there is no deity worthy of worship in existence except Allah. If he understands this meaning and believes in it from the depths of his heart, he will be saved from eternal abode in the Fire on the Day of Resurrection. Otherwise, it will not benefit him that he said "La ilaha illa Allah" except that he was saved from the sword in this world.
If we asked some of those engaged in politics such a question, they would be unable to answer. And as is narrated to us, there is a joke in some of the Syrian countries: A Kurd met a Jew on the road during the decline of Islam, so he grabbed him by the collar and drew his dagger beside him. He said to him: "Islamize or I will kill you." He said: "What do I say?" He said: "By Allah, I do not know." He is killing him to make him Islamize, but when he asks him about the path of Islam, he says: "I do not know." With people like these, the politicians want to achieve victory over the enemy surrounding us from all sides. There is no victory ever, except first of all by understanding the oneness of Allah in the first testimony, "La ilaha illa Allah," and then by understanding the second testimony, that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah. And as we say, and all the callers in this land and others say, the first testimony necessitates that we do not worship anyone with Allah, and the other testimony necessitates that we do not worship Allah except by what Allah has prescribed. So these two meanings are what most Muslims today, especially those engaged in politics, do not know. And he who lacks a thing cannot give it. So we do not call for political work, not because political work is not prescribed, for Islam is broader than what they imagine, but as some said:
"If you seek knowledge, it is vast, *** and your life is too short to acquire it all.
So present the more important of the two, the more important ***
So we must look today at what is most needed for the Islamic world? What is most needed for the Islamic world to be recognized? Is it political work, or is it understanding the creed of the testimony that there is no deity but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah? And improving their faith in the unseen, which is the first attribute that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) mentioned in the first chapter of al-Baqarah:[Al-Baqarah 2:2] Who are they? [Al-Baqarah 2:3] Then He mentioned So what is the matter today, the Islamic world is living in labyrinths related to faith in the unseen, and particularly, if the expression is correct, people are lost today in faith in the unseen of the unseen, which is the Lord of the worlds (Blessed and Exalted is He), as evidenced by the fact that the specialists of the Islamic world today in many countries do not know Allah as Allah described Himself in His Book, and as His Prophet described Him in his Sunnah? No, the calamity is greater. I say, or I said earlier: they do not know Allah as He described Himself, and as His Prophet described Him, but they know Him in contradiction to that. They know Allah in contradiction to what Allah described Himself with. This is the problem of problems.
The Shaykh : We say, we are sorry for these people who think they are doing well by engaging in political work, while they have not yet corrected their creed, nor understood the oneness of their Lord. We say to them: The Salafi call, in its various names that I mentioned earlier, means understanding Islam in a general and comprehensive way in all its rulings. It is not limited to the oneness of Allah, nor to what is broader than that in the circle of creeds as defined by scholars, nor is it limited to acts of worship, nor morals, nor transactions. Rather, it relates to understanding Islam from its two pure sources: the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), with a very important addition, which is according to the methodology of the righteous Salaf (may Allah be pleased with them). We have all worked within the limits of our ability—Zayd, Bakr, 'Amr, and so on—each working within the limits of his ability to clarify this Islam from all its aspects. One individual may not be able to undertake explaining Islam from all its aspects, but it is obligatory for the Ummah, for the Ummah as a whole, or in other words, for the specialists of the Ummah, or for the scholars truly, for them to undertake explaining Islam in light of the Book and the Sunnah and the methodology of the righteous Salaf. This is the call. As for if a person among us, for example, only corrects authentic hadiths and weakens weak hadiths, this does not mean he is not doing other work, but his other work may be less than that, or close to it. Similarly, if another man derives rulings from the Book of Allah alone, another from the hadiths of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) alone, and a third from the combination of both sources, the Book and the Sunnah, but he is not able, for example, to authenticate or weaken, we do not criticize him for not doing the work of that other person, nor do we speak of him because he is not doing the work of the first or the third, and so on. Rather, it is obligatory for this group of scholars to work toward making the entire Muslim Ummah understand Islam with the correct understanding, with the aforementioned condition.
When there is a group that rises to this duty of clarification according to the aforementioned methodology, then the believers will rejoice in the victory of Allah. Do we want to engage in political work, even if we took a leader of a group who engages in political work and claims that he works for Islam and for establishing the state of Islam? If we asked him: What is the oneness of lordship? What is the oneness of worship? What is the oneness of attributes? Perhaps it would be as the old Arabic proverb says: "He is more confused than one who is looking for a goat", meaning he is at the utmost inability to answer this question, which relates to the first testimony, from which a disbeliever does not escape except by acknowledging it, from the sword of Islam first, and then he does not escape from eternal abode in the Fire except if he first understands its meaning correctly, in detail as referred to earlier, which includes that "La ilaha illa Allah" means: there is no deity worthy of worship in existence except Allah. If he understands this meaning and believes in it from the depths of his heart, he will be saved from eternal abode in the Fire on the Day of Resurrection. Otherwise, it will not benefit him that he said "La ilaha illa Allah" except that he was saved from the sword in this world.
If we asked some of those engaged in politics such a question, they would be unable to answer. And as is narrated to us, there is a joke in some of the Syrian countries: A Kurd met a Jew on the road during the decline of Islam, so he grabbed him by the collar and drew his dagger beside him. He said to him: "Islamize or I will kill you." He said: "What do I say?" He said: "By Allah, I do not know." He is killing him to make him Islamize, but when he asks him about the path of Islam, he says: "I do not know." With people like these, the politicians want to achieve victory over the enemy surrounding us from all sides. There is no victory ever, except first of all by understanding the oneness of Allah in the first testimony, "La ilaha illa Allah," and then by understanding the second testimony, that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah. And as we say, and all the callers in this land and others say, the first testimony necessitates that we do not worship anyone with Allah, and the other testimony necessitates that we do not worship Allah except by what Allah has prescribed. So these two meanings are what most Muslims today, especially those engaged in politics, do not know. And he who lacks a thing cannot give it. So we do not call for political work, not because political work is not prescribed, for Islam is broader than what they imagine, but as some said:
"If you seek knowledge, it is vast, *** and your life is too short to acquire it all.
So present the more important of the two, the more important ***
So we must look today at what is most needed for the Islamic world? What is most needed for the Islamic world to be recognized? Is it political work, or is it understanding the creed of the testimony that there is no deity but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah? And improving their faith in the unseen, which is the first attribute that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) mentioned in the first chapter of al-Baqarah: