Reminding the Shaykh to take care in straightening the rows and not to pray in the pillars.

The Shaykh : If you allow me a moment, I will mention something. Allah the Exalted said: And among the most important things that must be reminded to people is what the masses of people have been afflicted with through ignorance of it, or at least through negligence regarding it. What should be prioritized for reminder before anything else is what is unknown to the masses of people or what they are negligent about. Most of the old mosques were built when they were built, and architectural engineering had not yet helped them to build a mosque without pillars and without columns. Therefore, it is rare for a mosque to be free of having many pillars and columns. And these pillars, when they were built, were built without planning by an engineer who is a jurist in Islam, or at least without cooperating with a scholar from among the scholars. The truth is that the sciences we referred to in the previous speech, which are the collective obligation sciences, cannot be shouldered or fulfilled by one individual scholar. Rather, each individual among them performs one of these collective obligations. But these obligations do not benefit them unless they are cooperating, as the Lord of the Worlds said: It should have been that when mosques were built, the engineers sought our opinion in building the mosque. Let us call it the Sunni mosque or the Salafi mosque, with a Salafi person in it, and a Salafi mosque as well, meaning according to the Sunnah, according to what came in the hadiths that the Companions transmitted to us. Among the strange and wondrous hadiths that have been neglected in application until today, even though that is easy and not difficult, is that those who have advanced, our brothers, have advanced as much as they could, as they say, "crowd together and show mercy to one another." I mean, there should be in every mosque a door called the Women's Door, meaning no one enters it except women. Just as the door specific to men, or the doors specific to men, women should not enter the mosque from any of those doors. This is taken from a hadith narrated by Abu Dawud in his Sunan through the route of Nafi', the freed slave of 'Abdullah ibn 'Umar ibn al-Khattab (may Allah be pleased with them both). Nafi' said from Ibn 'Umar that he entered with the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) one day into the mosque, the Prophet's Mosque, and he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: Nafi' said from his master Ibn 'Umar that Ibn 'Umar did not enter that mosque from that door at all after that, because the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: And you know today, whoever among you goes for Hajj or 'Umrah to the Prophet's Mosque, there is a door there called the Women's Door. This has been transmitted from generation to generation. And I remember well that it was granted to me to go to Egypt and visit some of the lands there, perhaps Suhaj or others, and Allah, I forgot its name. Some of my companions there took me to a mosque being newly built. Here will be the ablution area, and here will be the toilet, and there is such and such a door. I said to them, "And where is the Women's Door?" They said, "May Allah reward you with good," and they set aside a place to be made into a door for women. This is an easy matter, and yet people are negligent. But the difficult thing, which could not be achieved except in this time, is that a mosque be built, no matter how large and spacious, without pillars. Because these pillars become a cause for exposing the prayer of the worshippers—I do not say to invalidity and corruption, but at least to a decrease in the reward. That is because it came from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) two hadiths. One is from the hadith of Anas ibn Malik (may Allah be pleased with him), who said: In the time of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). And the other hadith is which inspired me with this word that we entered the mosque and found a row between the massive pillars, and I almost fell into praying in a broken row because I noticed that perhaps there was a row that was not yet complete. I found a gap and intended to fill it, and if it was a broken row because of the columns, this is one thing that should be observed. This is not my word, but the word of your Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), and his action and his command. They used to drive people away from the row between the columns forcefully in the time of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). The second thing is that I delayed to line up in a row that was not broken, and I found it, praise be to Allah. But the thing that caught my attention is that this row, which avoided lining up between the columns, fell into another violation. The reason is negligence or ignorance of the Sunnah. That is, this row was very far from the row in front of it, which is the one that the pillars and columns pass through. What is the reason? The reason is this religious innovation that the mosques of this time have been afflicted with, which is the lines that are drawn in the mosques, some lines with ink, some wires, and so on. Many people imagine, and the matter is as they say, "a matter with many threads, a speech that leads to another," that drawing these lines is from the prescribed matters. That is because people straighten the rows upon them. And this, in reality, contains a very important scientific and principled discussion. There are two rules, one of which is explicitly stated in the words of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him), which is his saying: And I do not want to delve into this hadith and the position of many contemporary scholars today toward this hadith, where they have nullified its generality and struck the hadith in the chest, saying, "Not every religious innovation is misguidance." This is opposing Allah and the Messenger and contradicting Him. The Messenger of Allah says: These people say, "No, not every religious innovation is misguidance." I do not want to delve into this here; this general rule from the words of the Infallible (peace and blessings be upon him) is sufficient for you. But I want to mention another rule taken from the proofs of the Book and the Sunnah by taking and deduction, and there is no explicit text for it as is the case with the first rule. It is the rule called "blocking the means to harm." The rule of "blocking the means to harm," and like it is "what is not fulfilled except by it is obligatory." Here we stop now. Many people think that drawing these threads in the mosques is from the category of unconnected public benefits, from the category of unconnected public benefits, which includes what we mentioned: "what is not fulfilled except by it is obligatory." Is the rule of unconnected public benefits, which is correct without doubt, applied in its entirety? Here is the discussion, and I hope to shorten it as much as I can. This rule must be taken and applied in its broadest meanings, with one condition: that it does not contradict the Sunnah. And the Sunnah, as you know, has three sections: saying, doing, and approving. And there is no doubt and no hesitation that all our brothers present know that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) did not say the opening takbir in prayer as imam for the people until he ordered the straightening of the rows, and would say to Zayd, "Move forward," and to another, "Move back," and so on, until he would straighten the rows as arrows are straightened. And he (peace be upon him) was very strict and emphasized the matter of straightening the rows until he would say: If the Messenger of Allah concerned himself with ordering the straightening of the rows and saying "move forward" and "move back," do you think it was possible to draw a thread from palm fibers at that time? And there were many of them. Could he (peace be upon him) have done that or not? The answer is obvious. Did the Messenger do that? The answer is no. So is it permissible for us to do that? The answer is no. Why? Because the cause for establishing a matter was not present in the time of the Messenger, and he did not do it. So our establishing it, with the cause present in that time and his not establishing it, is from the religious innovations that fall under the generality of his previously mentioned saying (peace and blessings be upon him): So it is not permissible to be deceived by this newly invented matter and religious innovation that has spread today in the mosques of the Muslims. The reason for its spread is one of two things, and the bitterest of them is sweet: the negligence of the scholars regarding the correct jurisprudence derived from the Book and the Sunnah, or, without their negligence, they do not concern themselves with teaching their Muslim brothers. So this religious innovation arose and spread in the mosques. Then another problem: those who draw these lines are also not scholars. And here is the point now in the discussion: you find a line where if a worshipper stands at it, he will hit the pillar with his head. Oh, people, why did they draw this line? Delay it a little so that the worshippers can prostrate to their Lord as they should prostrate. There is no room for this line. Why is this line? That line went to waste and that place was wasted. What resulted? They made a second line behind it, and this is what I witnessed tonight. When we entered, the people were standing, and the row was almost full. It is possible to insert a second row between the pillar and this row, but where did the error arise? From those who drew these lines without thinking and without awareness. So when I joined the row, I found a long distance between me and the column. Is there a violation of the Shari'ah here? We say: Yes. He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: Here there is a spacing between the rows. So it should be that the first line, where if the worshipper stands he cannot prostrate behind the column, is delayed by the width of two fingers, and he stands in the row, and thus the second row is behind him, and so on. If one religious innovation leads to another, many and very many. This religious innovation is the lines spread today in the mosques. These should not be there. Why? Because people rely on them for straightening the rows. And take the example now of this Sunnah that has spread, by the grace of Allah the Mighty and Majestic, in these recent years in many lands, in Jordan, and it had been killed before. It is the Sunnah of establishing the prayer of the two festivals in the prayer ground. The prayer ground is ordinary land, and there are no lines drawn. You find the rows to be among the worst of rows you have seen, because the people did not line up except on the thread. Here there is no thread, so you find something sticking out and something missing, and a sight of the ugliest sights. What led to the lack of concern for straightening the rows? These lines that are drawn in the mosques and contradict the saying and doing of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him). Move forward, move back, and so on. The imams of the mosques have rested from performing this obligation. This thread has relieved them of it. And therefore, I am reminding you of what I witnessed: this line that is close to the pillar must be delayed a little so that the one standing behind the pillar can prostrate, and so that the row that does not want to line up between the columns is not far from the row in front of it. And this row between the columns, why? Let the row be in front of the columns. So this column, for example, the row, meaning the qiblah, the line is here. They do not stand here. The matter is very easy, but it needs a reminder. And I have reminded you. Let the witness inform the absent one. Yes, please.

The questioner : O Shaykh, some questions, may Allah reward you.