Explaining the difference between the Salafi school and the Khalafi school, and providing evidence for this through the story of the slave girl in the hadith of Mu'awiyah ibn al-Hakam al-Sulami

The Shaykh : ... And it is sufficient for you, in the end, to know the difference between one who graduates from the Salafi school and one who graduates from the Khalafi school: look at the schools. The Salafi school is the school of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him), from which his Companions (may Allah be pleased with them) graduated; so it is no wonder that he (peace and blessings be upon him) commanded us to follow them, as the evidence for that has been mentioned previously. If you want evidence of one who graduates from the Salafi school, he will be on the guidance of his Lord, even if he is from the common people. And one who graduates from the Khalafi school will be in clear misguidance, even if he is among the most knowledgeable people; like those who united against Ibn Taymiyyah (may Allah have mercy on him) in the story mentioned earlier. If you want to discern this reality, recall with me the hadith of that slave girl whose master had struck her and slapped her a slap, in a story narrated by her master, who is Mu'awiyah ibn al-Hakam al-Sulami, in a hadith narrated by Imam Muslim in his "Sahih." It is long, so I will abbreviate it now to only the point of the evidence: Mu'awiyah ibn al-Hakam said: "O Messenger of Allah, I have a slave girl who tends my sheep in Uhud. One day a wolf attacked my sheep, and I am a human being who gets angry as humans do, so I struck her a blow, and I am obligated to free a slave. He said to him (peace and blessings be upon him): . When she came, he (peace and blessings be upon him) said to her: . - Listen to this hadith, memorize it, understand it, and preserve it - He (peace and blessings be upon him) said to her: . She said: "In the sky." He said to her: . She said: "You are the Messenger of Allah." He said (peace and blessings be upon him): .
The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) testified for this woman, who was a shepherdess, that she was a believer. Why? Because she knew her Lord, and that He , and that He is above His creation (Blessed and Exalted is He). How could it be otherwise, when she lives in a society, in a school—as it is said today in the language of the modern age—which is the school of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him), and her master is one of its students; he is the one who transmitted this creed to her. And so, when the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) asked her this probing question about her creed, she answered with the correct answer. She said: "Allah is in the sky." How could it be otherwise? Even if she did not memorize Surat al-Tariq, at the very least she heard from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), or at the very least from her master, who recites from Surat al-Tariq every night: . She heard this verse recited by her master or by her Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), so she believed in this verse as every Arab understands it. And so she answered with the correct answer when he (peace and blessings be upon him) asked her: . She said: "In the sky."
Do you know the position of the Khalaf today, those who write some books and some treatises claiming that the Khalaf are more precise and more knowledgeable than them? They say: "This question mentioned in this hadith is not permissible to ask today!!" This is not only a contradiction of the methodology of the Salaf, but they also contradict the authentic hadiths. This aligns with the first example; the first example where we said that they reject authentic hadiths merely because they relate to creed, even if they are authentic hadiths and the scholars of the Muslims have agreed on their authenticity. Among them is this hadith, which Imam Muslim narrated in his "Sahih," and Imam Malik narrated in his "Muwatta," and Imam Ahmad narrated in his "Musnad," and everyone who has a narration in the Sunnah narrated it, except for a few. They treated it as one of the established authentic hadiths. Then these Khalafis came and rejected this hadith, saying: "It is not permissible for you to ask this question: Where is Allah?!" When it is said to them: "The Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) asked this question," they answer you by saying that this is an ahad hadith first. Then they increase in argumentation and say: "And even if it is established that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) asked this question, he only approved the slave girl's statement that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) is in the sky because she was a non-Arab!! And because she did not know the correct creed!!" Here they fall into another problem, as we said regarding their interpretation: ; where they interpreted "istawa" (rose above) as "istawla" (took control), so it was reported to them that there was someone who contended with Allah for His Throne, so He overcame him and took control of His Throne. That is far misguidance. Similarly, here they attribute to the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) that he remained silent about the slave girl because, in their view, her answer was incorrect; even though Allah (Mighty and Majestic), as you heard earlier, said: to the end of the verse.