Clarification of the issue: Is it from the Sunnah to prefer the right side in everything, even in putting on a watch and other things that are placed on the hand?

The Shaykh : Every time I lift my leg, I have to hit it like this or press it with the gas pedal. I praise Allah, because last year every movement was painful, but now there is nothing. Of course, there is nothing of that sort, though there is still a little bit.
Al-Halabi : Our Shaykh, may the movement be a blessing.

The Shaykh : Praise be to Allah .
Abu Layla : There is an issue, meaning, among some of our brothers.

The Shaykh : And upon you be peace, and the mercy of Allah and His blessings. Welcome.

The questioner : Our Shaykh, there is an issue with some of our brothers, meaning, it is confusing to them or they have some comments about it regarding the right hand. That is, a person takes a phone number with the right hand or puts on a watch with the right hand. What is your opinion on this issue, meaning?

The Shaykh : There is no question until we answer it. What is our opinion on the issue? If we want to answer without clarification, that is a shock to the Islamic principle. So we need to see what the problem is in that?

The questioner : The problem, my Shaykh, is that they say there is no need, for example, to put on the watch with the right hand. People are accustomed to wearing it on the left. So we said this is a Sunnah, wearing it on the right. Second, regarding the phone number, meaning, when we present it to some people, for example, when some people ask us for phone numbers, we hand them over from the right. They object, saying, "Brother, everyone hands them over from the left. Why this?" If you call from the right, when you dial the phone number, you do, yes. So these people, meaning, we say this is the Sunnah, and a person should prefer the right side in everything to the extent of his ability.

The Shaykh : Dismantling this doubt is the word "people," which was repeated more than once.

The questioner : Yes.

The Shaykh : Who are these people? Are they those who should be a model for Muslims, or are they those whom the Master of the Messengers ordered us to differ from?

The questioner : The former.

The Shaykh : I do not think that any of these doubters or skeptics would say that these people are our model. Rather, if they have some understanding and knowledge, these are the people we were ordered to differ from, as in his saying (peace and blessings be upon him) . These people, truly, and I am compelled to be frank, are ignorant of Islam. They think that Islam is only a matter of prayer, fasting, charity, truthfulness in speech, sincerity in action, and the like of noble morals. But Islam is much broader than what they think. Islam wants Muslims to have a distinct, prominent personality, distinguished from all other nations, not only in creed, behavior, and morals, but even in appearances. And so it prohibited, with the strongest prohibition, every Muslim from imitating or dressing like a disbeliever. Even though this dress is a formal, outward appearance, Islam cares about appearances as it cares about inner states. We have spoken repeatedly about the connection between the outward and the inward, or the connection between the inward and the outward, and that there is no separation between them. Among those hadiths is what we used to mention on this occasion and others, his saying (peace and blessings be upon him) . And this is a long discussion, meaning, you must have tapes on it. But I return now to the phone number. Whoever has some culture and knowledge of Western customs knows that these disbelievers start writing from the left, and that Muslims start writing from the right. I think that these doubters or skeptics do not distinguish between a person starting to write with the right or the left. And this will tie them, unfortunately, in a strong bond with the Atatürks, who imposed on the Muslim Turkish people not to write in foreign letters, nor to write in Arabic letters. Why? Because their way differed from our way, contrary to what the Messenger said regarding Hajj: our way differs from the way of the polytheists. So the disbelievers write from left to right, and we write from right to left. Do we see that we write only the letters, or also the numbers? We ask each other now: how do you write numbers? Do you start from the right or from the left? So why do these people take offense?
Al-Halabi : The numbers, my Shaykh, are from the left.

The Shaykh : From the right. 71, how do you write it?
Al-Halabi : Let us stick to phone numbers.

The Shaykh : No problem. The important thing is that you have now returned to "the people." And we must be with the Master of people. He came with a clear Arabic language and Arabic writing, whether it be letters or numbers, and they are started from the right to the left. These machines that we enjoy now are undoubtedly innovations of the disbelievers. But that does not require us to be followers of them in everything. We are able to differ from them in it. And you have repeated to the ears of our brothers, many times and many times, that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) ordered the Muslims, as mentioned previously in the hadith just now, to differ from the disbelievers in something that is not of their doing, but rather is what Allah the Exalted has decreed by His Sunnah for all humanity, which is gray hair. There is no difference between a Muslim and a disbeliever in that both of them grow gray, whether they will it or not. So if there are two old men, one Muslim and the other a disbeliever, our Lord the Exalted’s Sunnah in His creation is not to distinguish the gray-haired Muslim by not making him gray, to prefer him over the disbeliever.The Shaykh : Rather, the Sunnah of Allah the Exalted, the legislative Sunnah, is to distinguish the gray-haired Muslim from the gray-haired disbeliever by an action that comes from the gray-haired Muslim, which is dyeing. So he (peace and blessings be upon him) said . If the concern of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) in differing from the polytheists reached even to a matter that is not of their making, but rather is of the making of the Lord of the Worlds, and yet our Lord ordered us, through our Prophet, to dye in opposition to the gray hair of the disbelievers, which is not of their making, then does the intelligent Muslim not understand that it is intended for the Muslim to differ from the disbeliever in what is of their doing, and in what is contrary to our doing, we the believers? The answer is yes, then yes, then yes.
Now we return to one of the examples mentioned in the question or the issue: wearing the watch. The watch is, of course, an innovation of the disbelievers. As for the first watch, it is well known in Islamic history that it was an innovation of the Muslims. Likewise, the telephone and telephone numbers are innovations of the disbelievers. If the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) reached the point of opposing the polytheists in their gray hair, as we mentioned, which was not of their own making, would not the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) have ordered us, to affirm our opposition, to wear our watches on our right hands rather than our left? That would be even more so. Why? Because when they chose to wear their watches on their left hands, that was part of their guidance and their custom, and it was not something Allah (Mighty and Majestic) obligated upon them. If we are commanded to oppose them in what Allah obligated upon them, are we not commanded to oppose them in what is of their own making and custom? The answer, as we said, is yes. Therefore, Muslims today are, in reality, heedless of their Shari'ah in hundreds of aspects and issues. This heedlessness is divided into two types: sometimes it is practical heedlessness without the realization of the heedlessness in knowledge, and sometimes both are combined, becoming both scholarly and practical heedlessness. Of the first type, many of the specialists know that Islam forbade Muslims from imitating the disbelievers. The principle of imitation and the prohibition of imitating the disbelievers is known, at least, to the specialists among Muslims, but it is not practiced by the majority. Therefore, you see among them the great shaykhs who care about the attire that indicates they are of a special class, namely the scholars. They care about wearing turbans on their heads and wearing robes that they drag on the ground like women, and they widen their sleeves contrary to the Shari'ah. Likewise, we find them shaving their beards, and some of them shave their mustaches as well. All of this is of the first type: they know the prohibition of imitation, yet they do not practically care to cease this imitation. But the second type, which I said is a double heedlessness—scholarly and practical—is that they do not know that among the principles and rules of Islam is the command to oppose the polytheists. This is something in addition to imitating the polytheists, because imitating the polytheist is to do their action, whereas opposition is broader: to oppose them not only in their actions, but also in what is not of their actions, such as the gray hair mentioned earlier. So, if it is the custom of the disbelievers to write from left to right, the guidance of the Muslims is to oppose their guidance; we write from right to left. And if it is the custom of the disbelievers to wear their watches on their left hands, we oppose them. Why do some people find this opposition burdensome, when it is among the objectives of the Shari'ah, and they want to do what the people do, namely the disbelievers? This returns to the double heedlessness: scholarly and practical. We ask Allah (Mighty and Majestic) to make us see, to teach us our religion, and to inspire us to act according to the rulings of our Shari'ah.
Al-Halabi : Our Shaykh, speaking of numbers and the issue of Atatürk, how did the disbelievers replace the Muslims' numbers with their own? In this book exhibition held a few months ago in Jordan, I saw in the Libyan pavilion a very large mushaf, about this size, with a page that is perhaps half the size of a door, which is quite striking. This is the first striking thing. The second is the numbers used to number the verses and the pages, which are foreign numbers. Naturally, everyone asks the person in charge of the Libyan pavilion, "Why is this?" He says, "These are the original Arabic numbers."

The Shaykh : So they claim.

The questioner : These are the original Arabic numbers, not the ones you are accustomed to. And so on. "Search, search, look in the books, look at this and that." That is what he says.

The Shaykh : A dialect, a dialect. Yes, indeed.

The questioner : A dialect... they say regarding the Arabic letters, even...

The Shaykh : It is not far-fetched, my brother, that their intention in the pre-Islamic age of ignorance was this, and he considers this to be of the pre-Islamic age of ignorance. Otherwise, I have not seen a manuscript...
Al-Halabi : ...with the numbers of the scholars...

The Shaykh : ...except with the numbers known today.