Does the one who strikes himself with a skewer and pulls it out of his mouth or his stomach fall under the category of sorcery?

The questioner : The question is roughly the same: some people use a skewer or a spike; by striking with the skewer, they pull it out of their mouth or their stomach. Does this fall under sorcery?

The Shaykh : What is this?

The questioner : They call these karamat (miracles granted to a righteous person).

The Shaykh : These are delusions, not karamat.

The questioner : Does it fall under sorcery?

The Shaykh : No, no, this is not sorcery.

The questioner : Is it conceivable that a messenger would come to any of them?

The Shaykh : This is practice, my brother, not sorcery. There is undoubtedly sorcery, but there are things these misguided people practice. Satan has made their deeds attractive to them, so he led them astray from the right path. There are things that are realities they commit, and they delude people into thinking these are karamat, when in fact they are insults and have absolutely nothing to do with karamat. The scholars of the Muslims, both past and present, have had many confrontations with these deceptions. When I was in Damascus and traveling toward the north, I passed through some towns like Homs, Hama, Aleppo, Idlib, and Latakia. In Aleppo, a man introduced himself to us, about thirty-five to forty-five years old, namedThe Shaykh : Ahmad, and his nickname is Arna'ut, meaning it appears his country of origin is from our region. I learned from our Salafi brothers that this man was a Shaykh of a Sufi path, then he apparently guided himself and joined the group. But it became clear to me later that he had a specific goal. The point is, this man told us about some of what he used to do when he was in the path, and what his like among the Shaykhs of the paths still do. For example, once we held a gathering, a dinner invitation. He turned off the lights, and suddenly the words "La ilaha illa Allah, Muhammad rasul Allah" appeared written on the wall. He uses what is now known as phosphorescent paint. This phosphorescent paint was not widespread in the old days, so he would write with this ink that is not visible unless...? So he would show his group that this was a karamat. Similarly, he did the following in front of us: he lit what we call a "bubur" (a type of lamp or burner). Here, he took a burner, lit its flame, and placed a flat iron spoon until it turned red. Then he would do this: you hear the sound of the red spoon touching the ember of the tongue. This is a karamat he considers or pretends to have in front of people, and the people are simple; the delusion and the trickery work easily on them. His tongue did not burn. He explains something to us that he thinks is hidden from us, saying the secret in this is that the spoon is made of iron, which has become an ember of fire. If he left it for a moment, his tongue would go, but he must be light-handed; otherwise, if he prolonged it a little, his tongue would burn. People do not notice; they think it is a karamat and that he is not affected by fire. And so he told us things and things, among which was a joke. He said, once a young Shaykh came whose father had died and left him his son after him, and he was young and not practiced in the deception of the Shaykhs. So he held a circle in front of the castle square there in Damascus, excuse me, in Aleppo, a very large square. They were gathering the rabble and the common people by beating the drum. The people gathered, and a very large circle formed in front of the castle. He placed the drum on the ground, and according to their claim, a karamat should appear to the people: he should stand on the drum and the angels should carry it, and the drum should jump with him. But because of his clumsiness, he did not know how to mount the drum. As soon as he placed his foot on it, the drum collapsed under him. Our friendThe Shaykh : Ahmad Arna'ut was pretending in front of him, saying, "Go, you have not reached the level yet." He would take the drum, turn it over to the other side, and stand on it, and indeed the drum did not collapse under him. "Oh!" and the people present would clap. And this is a "son of a jackal" (a term for a trickster), as they call him. He says, "The secret is here," and here is the point: he says, "Because of his clumsiness, he had to place the heel of his foot on the edge of the drum."