Is it permissible to trim the beard from the sides, and is it established that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) used to trim his own beard?

The questioner : ... .

The Shaykh : May Allah reward you with good. Leave it as it is. May Allah reward you with good.

The questioner : The next question: Is it permissible to trim the beard from the sides, and is it established that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) used to trim his own beard?

The Shaykh : Yes, I say it is not permissible to let the beard grow longer than a fist. This is because we belong to the righteous predecessors, as we have adopted the methodology of understanding the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) as the righteous predecessors did in their speech, action, and approval. Just as our position regarding the Prophetic Sunnah is that it consists of speech, action, and approval, we attach this detail to what the righteous predecessors were upon. I said earlier—and you have spoken well—that it is necessary to constantly emphasize, especially for us followers of the righteous predecessors, that when we call people to follow the Book and the Sunnah, we must include this, following the methodology of the righteous predecessors. It has become well-known and widespread, especially among students of knowledge, and more specifically among university students, that the evidence of the Shari'ah is the Book, the Sunnah, scholarly consensus, and analogical reasoning. This terminology is, in fact, necessary. However, those who coined this term and many of them applied it practically—I say many, because most people say what they do not do, not applying their rulings to these four evidences, but rather I mean the many who adopt this four-part division in both thought and practice—these people, in addition to those others, did not pay attention to the condition I mentioned earlier, which is understanding the Book and the Sunnah as the righteous predecessors did in their speech, action, and approval. I said earlier that I must bring this condition or this third requirement closer to you with a very simple example. If we want to understand the generality of his statement (peace and blessings be upon him) in such an authentic hadith: , there is no way for us to understand this generality in this hadith and others except by returning to what the righteous predecessors were upon in terms of worship and obedience. If we see a certain act of worship in a certain era that was not present in the time of the righteous predecessors, we say: It is a religious innovation. We do not have texts regarding every innovation, and there are many of these innovations. We do not have texts stating that this is an innovation and every innovation is misguidance, and this is an innovation and every innovation is [misguidance]. Rather, we derive that and indicate its innovated nature by returning to what the righteous predecessors were upon. If a specific statement comes from some of the predecessors that a certain new matter is an innovation, that is the strongest, because it came from them in speech. But in reality, this is very rare, because innovation in religion did not sprout its roots in the first era; they were still upon the Prophetic methodology, content and restricted to what reached them from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) in terms of worship. Innovations only began to sprout their roots after the first century, in the second century and beyond. Therefore, we rarely find a text from a man of the first generation of the Companions of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) explicitly stating that a specific new matter is an innovation. And because of the scarcity of this type of explicit statement, how do we know that these many innovations are innovations and that they fall under the generality of the hadiths warning against every innovation? We return to what our righteous predecessors were upon in speech, action, and approval, and we find no trace of this new matter or these many new matters in that pure, bright era. We say: It is an innovation. Thus, we cannot know or judge that a certain new matter is an innovation except by returning to what the righteous predecessors were upon. From here, we find that the masses of scholars and students of knowledge in the present era, as well as many of those before them, have missed many innovations because they included them in the generality of obedience and worship, and due to their distance from the Salafi methodology, they were unable to include them in the first generality. I give an example today regarding some of our brothers who are with us in following the Book and the Sunnah and the methodology of the righteous predecessors, yet many innovations deceive them, and they claim their lawfulness because they included them in the other generality, which is the generality of obedience and worship. For example, supplication and the like . They included many of these new matters in these generalities. I read a few years ago in a magazine, which you may know by its name, "Al-Jami'ah al-Salafiyyah," which is published.
The student : In Varanasi.

The Shaykh : In Varanasi. Yes, an article by one of the scholars of hadith stating the lawfulness of group supplication after prayer. He states the lawfulness of group supplication after prayer. He has no hadith from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) as a matter of course, nor does he have anything from the reports of the predecessors, but he argues with the generalities. However, he overlooked being a Salafi, or rather, he overlooked that being a Salafi means not adding any act of worship to what this righteous predecessor was upon, absolutely.