Discussion of the deception of some people regarding the issue of rent.

The questioner : Some people claim, meaning they build five shops and sit at their doors asking for rent, but they know that it is forbidden. However, they deceive by saying, "I want to employ them, meaning I want to open them as shops for me, but if someone pays me a price, I will give up one or two."

The Shaykh : Now, deception is known to be the practice of the Jews. The Jews were forbidden from working on the Sabbath, so they trapped the fish in the canals and caught them on Sunday. Allah cursed them and forbade them from eating some of the good things, namely the fats and the intestines, as is explicit in the Qur'an. So they deceived, and he (peace and blessings be upon him) said regarding them: What is the meaning of this hadith? That Allah forbade them the fats, as in the Qur'an: before that. When they transgressed and did evil and killed the prophets without right, our Lord, Mighty and Majestic, took revenge on them with things, among which was forbidding them some of the good things, including the fats. So he (peace be upon him) said, first clarifying this reality, then what was the position of the Jews toward it? He (peace be upon him) said: What does "they melted them" mean? They melted them and placed this fat of the sheep and the fats in the large pots and lit the fire underneath them, so they took a form other than the natural form. They thought that this is one thing and that is another, but the reality is one. This is called deceiving Allah, Mighty and Majestic. meaning they melted them. And therefore, the Muslims must first take a lesson from the verses mentioned in the Qur'an and the Prophetic hadiths of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) as a report of what happened in the nations before us regarding violations of the Shari'ah rulings. We must take a lesson from that by asking ourselves: Why does our Lord narrate about the Jews and the Christians that they did such and such? It is so that we do not fall into what they fell into, in order to realize the wisdom that says, "Whoever sees the lesson in others, let him take a lesson." The Jews, Allah forbade them some things, they went around them, twisted them, doubled them, and made them sweet, so they were cursed because of that and transformed into apes and pigs. And the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) informed us of this by his saying, and this is part of his advice to us and his compassion and mercy for us: This hadith is in *Sahih al-Bukhari*, in a narration in al-Tirmidhi and others. So the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) narrated to us the tragedies and disgraces of the nations that were before us so that we may be cautious and stay away from doing what they did. Now, have the Muslims fallen into what the Jews did? The answer is yes, with great regret. You have now heard Abu Ayyub asking that this person says, "I do not want to take rent, but I want to do what to employ the place so that someone comes?" This is an imaginary image because he is only employing the place. If he is successful, he will not leave it, and then he wants to employ one place, or two, or three. Just as he imagined, this is a deception of the Shari'ah ruling, twisting and turning, and nothing is hidden from Allah on earth or in the sky. So if the Muslims fall into what the Jews before us fell into, deceiving what Allah, Mighty and Majestic, has forbidden, and there are many and very many examples of this, and unfortunately some of these examples are recorded in some fiqh books.