Encouraging the emulation of the Companions in their exaltation of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): the Shari'ah-prescribed exaltation, such as not standing up for him

The Shaykh : Here there are two pronouns. The first pronoun refers to the Companions who are in the lower rank, and the second pronoun refers to the Companions who are in the higher rank. Is this clear? The Companions are divided into two groups, and so are those who came after them. Let us include all those who come after them, namely those who follow them with excellence. Those who follow the Companions of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) with excellence are also in two tiers: a higher tier and a lower tier. Now, returning to that word, "high ambition is part of faith." Are we not satisfied for ourselves except to be of the higher tier, like the Companions of the Messenger (peace be upon him) who were of the higher tier? And are we not satisfied for ourselves to be of the lower tier? Even if they have the honor of companionship, that is something we cannot attain. But we may attain something that surpasses that rank. And so the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) pointed to this meaning in his saying in the well-known authentic hadith: He also pointed to it in his saying (peace and blessings be upon him): And in another hadith: So we should be of this tier for whom the reward of fifty may be written. But this, as they say in our region of Sham, "requires shaking the shoulders," meaning it requires effort, not just wishes. This shaking of the shoulders is a euphemism for earnest work, which is nothing but following the Sunnah. And here is the crux of the matter, as they say from the previous word. So how do we achieve love?The Shaykh : We said, judge now forThe Shaykh : with the death penalty, and bind yourselves to the Master of Mankind. How do you achieve your love for the Master of Mankind so that the so-called Shaykh has a share in this realization of following? How was the first generation, the first generation of the Companions of the Messenger (peace be upon him), like Abu Bakr and 'Umar? Is there anything that remains to occupy us from what we are directing ourselves to regarding the hadith? Is that so?

The questioner : That is correct.

The Shaykh : May Allah reward you with good.
The Shaykh: Our previous discourse reached the reminder that those who follow the righteous Salaf with excellence must be among those of high ambition, and they must try to imitate the best of the Companions in their stance toward the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) and in their way of honoring and exalting him, not the general Companions. Or, in the previous expression we used, we must make our emulation and following of the great Companions in their way of exalting and honoring their Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family). I want to reach the point I was aiming for in my previous speech: when we study the biography of the Companions of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) with their Prophet, we find them divided into two groups:
The Shaykh: The first group, which is the better group, is from the predecessors who were the first among the Companions of the Noble Messenger. The other group is the first group. The first group did not do what you do for him, whether you are with us on the Salafi methodology in general, or what the others do with their Shaykhs. This first generation did not exalt their Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) by the means by which some of you—I say some of you—exalt your Shaykhs, let alone the others who do not care about following the Sunnah as you do. Those others have no limits in their contradiction of the Sunnah, claiming to honor and exalt the Shaykhs. So now I want you to emulate the first generation of the Companions of the Messenger (peace be upon him). How did they exalt him (peace and blessings be upon him and his family)? It is barely permissible for you to exalt your Shaykhs, barely, let alone to increase in exalting them beyond how they exalted their Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family). Because their conduct in exalting their Prophet is the expression and realization of the noble verse we mentioned previously, which is the saying of He who is Blessed and Exalted: So you, for example, know this and then do not contradict it, and praise be to Allah, that the Companions of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) did not exalt their Prophet by standing up for him when he entered upon them. You are with the Companions in this, but the others contradict this by standing up for the people they want to exalt, and they do not pay attention to his guidance (peace be upon him) with his Companions and the conduct of his Companions with him (peace and blessings be upon him), under the pretext of exaltation and honor. And we say that exaltation and honor for the people of knowledge is only by what the higher tier of the Companions did to exalt their Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him).
The Shaykh: Since the matter is so, did these noble Companions exalt their Prophet by kissing? The answer is no. Did they exalt him by embracing? The answer is no. Some of the Companions from the second tier, it is established from some of them that they used to kiss the hand of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family). And so we do not absolutely deny the kissing of the hand of a scholar, truly, and on the condition that he is also one who acts upon his knowledge and is righteous. We do not deny the permissibility of this kissing, but we say that it is a weaker position of permissibility, because we did not know that regarding the higher tier of the Companions of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) with their Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). Likewise, we do not deny embracing, for it is also established that some embracing of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) occurred from some of his Companions, even in the presence of others, let alone when they were arriving from travel. It is established that some of them used to embrace one another upon meeting after travel. We do not deny this.
The Shaykh: But our entire discussion does not revolve around what is permissible, but rather around the means of realizing If this is the crux of the discussion, I think you now know how the exaltation of the Shaykhs should be, those in whom you may have a good opinion, that they have some knowledge, that they have some mindfulness of Allah, and you want to do something of their right, as he (peace and blessings be upon him) said in the authentic hadith: So you want, may Allah bless you, to realize something of this knowledge that the Messenger (peace be upon him) mentioned is part of the guidance of the Muslims, and that whoever contradicts this guidance is not from us, and we are not from those who do not know the right of our workers. Is the realization of this knowledge by kissing and embracing? No, it is not so. If we say it is permissible, then permissibility is sufficient for you. But by Allah, we love you and we want to show our love for you; this is not the way, because it is not the way of those we claim to follow with excellence until the Day of Judgment. This is what I wanted to clarify in answer to the previous question that Abu Faris initiated and referred to the famous one, and then the famous one we heard from him, and perhaps I have answered.

The questioner : May Allah bless you.

The Shaykh : May Allah bless you. Do you inform us with what you have recorded from your aids?

The Shaykh : And the audience laughed.

The Shaykh : Is this permissible or not permissible? It is permissible.