A new chapter from the chapters of *Al-Adab al-Mufrad* by Imam al-Bukhari is now presented.

The Shaykh : A new chapter from the chapters of *Al-Adab al-Mufrad* by Imam al-Bukhari is now presented. It is his saying: "The Chapter on Stinginess." He also narrates with his authentic chain of transmission from Jabir, who said: The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: . Banu Salmah, one of the Arab tribes, asked the people of this tribe, or some of them: "Who is your master? Who is your leader? Who is the highest among you?" We said: "Jud ibn Qays." Jud is an Arab name. They said, "This is our leader, Jud ibn Qays, but the group are Arabs and Muslims, and they are truthful in what they say. After they mentioned that their leader is so-and-so, they followed that by saying: 'On the condition that we consider him stingy.' They mentioned a defect in him: 'On the condition that we consider him stingy,' meaning we find him stingy, even though he is our leader. It is expected of a leader to be noble and generous, but he is the opposite: 'On the condition that we consider him stingy.' The Messenger responded to them by saying: . Its original form is: "Adwa" .
In this hadith, there are in fact benefits, among the most important of which is: The mention by Banu Salmah to the Messenger (peace be upon him), in the absence of Jud ibn Qays, their leader, that he was stingy, here has a jurisprudential benefit, which is that it is permissible to backbite a man if a Sharia benefit follows from it. This is the backbiting of the people of Banu Salmah to the Messenger (peace be upon him) when he asked them about their leader and master, saying, "So-and-so, on the condition that we consider him stingy," meaning they described him as stingy. This is backbiting, because you all know that backbiting is... Drink with your right hand, and do not drink with the left. Teach your children Islamic etiquette. So, the speaker saying "we consider him stingy," meaning we find him stingy, is backbiting, because backbiting, as he (peace and blessings be upon him) said in the authentic hadith: . And each of us, when he mentions what is in him of bad character, it is backbiting without doubt. If I say: "Zayd among people is stingy," he would dislike it, even if he knows from himself that he is stingy. If I say: "So-and-so is angry," and he is indeed angry, but this is something he dislikes. And so on, it is all backbiting, because the Messenger (peace be upon him) says: . The questioner then said, thinking that mentioning a person with what is in him is without harm. When the Messenger (peace be upon him) mentioned that there is all harm in it, he said: "If I did not mention what is in him, would there be no harm in it?" He said: . Slander is a greater and greater sin.
So, if backbiting is mentioning your brother with what he dislikes, how did the people of Banu Salmah describe their leader and master in the presence of the Messenger (peace be upon him) as stingy, and the Messenger (peace be upon him) approved them of that and did not say to them: "What are you doing? Why are you backbiting him?" as some of the scrupulous, or some of the overly strict, do. When an occasion arises to describe a man with a bad character in him, warning people, one scrupulous or overly strict person stands up and says: "My brother, we do not want to backbite people." We must know the details of the ruling on backbiting, and this hadith gives us an example of this detail. The original ruling is that backbiting is forbidden, and its criterion is: that the one who backbites has no religious benefit when he backbites the one backbitten, but rather it is for spreading character flaws, or for entertainment, or for idle talk, or otherwise. All of this is forbidden backbiting. But if the backbiting is not intended for entertainment, but rather for an Islamic benefit, this becomes permissible backbiting. And this, of course, varies in many forms. Some scholars collected them in a verse of poetry, saying: "Criticism is not backbiting in six cases: The aggrieved, the one who informs, the one who warns, the one who is open in sin, the one who seeks a ruling, and the one seeking help in removing a wrong." Six things, and each of these branches contains many sub-branches, but the summary of these six characteristics is what was permitted and excepted from forbidden backbiting. So the scholar-poet said: "Criticism is not backbiting in six cases." The first is: "The aggrieved": The aggrieved means the one who has been wronged. The wronged person has the right to say, "So-and-so wronged me." Why? Because he did all possible means to reach his right from that wrongdoer but did not succeed and did not prevail. What remained was to publicize it among people, perhaps he will feel a little and present the right to this wronged person. And for this reason, the Messenger (may Allah's prayers and peace be upon him) explicitly stated this ruling and this permissibility, saying: . . The softness and delay, as in the other hadith: . And the one who has the means is the rich one. . That is, the delay of the one who has the means, i.e., the rich one who finds what suffices for the right, is considered injustice by the wise Lawgiver. So he (peace be upon him) said in the previous hadith: . His honor is made lawful. The intended meaning is that it is lawful to attack him and criticize him, but it is not said, for example, "So-and-so is a liar" if he is known to be truthful. He speaks with honesty, criticizing his honor specifically regarding what concerns this wronged person. Only this is the meaning of . . Who punishes him? The Muslim ruler. The Muslim ruler has the right to summon the wrongdoer who refuses to perform the right owed to this wronged person, and punish him by flogging him fifteen times, as he sees fit for his discipline, so that he does not return to encroaching on the rights of people again. So this hadith is explicit in permitting the backbiting of the wrongdoer. "The one who has the means, his honor is made lawful" means criticizing him and punishing him. So the first characteristic of what is excepted from forbidden backbiting is the wronged person. The aggrieved: meaning he complains of his injustice to people, saying: "So-and-so wronged me." And this ruling is not only in the hadith, but also in the Noble Qur'an, where Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) said: . One who has been wronged is permitted to speak openly of the bad things regarding the one who wronged him. This is the first type excepted from forbidden backbiting: the aggrieved. "And the one who informs": This is an example before us now from many examples. The Messenger (peace be upon him) asked some of the Companions from Banu Salmah: . They said: "Jud ibn Qays." He was asking them to inform him, so they answered him by informing him (peace be upon him), and they said: "On the condition that we consider him stingy." Clearer than this example: When a woman came and two men had proposed to her, she came to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) and said: "O Messenger of Allah, so-and-so and so-and-so have proposed to me." She said Abu Jahm with a meem, not Abu Jahl with a lam. Abu Jahm is from the Companions, and Mu'awiyah ibn Abi Sufyan. Each of them proposed to me. So it was as if she was saying: I am confused, should I agree to this one or this one? And as if she was saying: Advise me, O Messenger of Allah, should I agree to this one or this one? The Messenger (peace be upon him) did not say to her, "Take this one" or "Take that one," because the matter is sensitive; women's intentions and goals are different. So what the Messenger (peace be upon him) did was nothing but to describe each of the two suitors to the woman to whom each had proposed. Therefore he (peace be upon him) said: . So we find here that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) criticized both suitors for that woman so that she would be fully aware.