Miscellaneous by Al-Albani-296

'Aid 'Abassi: It is narrated from Abu Hurayrah that he used to say: "Faith is like one of your garments; you put it on at one time and take it off at another." And it is narrated from him, traced to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) And Ahmad narrated from Ibn Abbas that he said to his young men: "Whoever among you wishes to marry, we will marry him. No one among you commits fornication except that Allah removes from him the light of faith. If He wills to return it, He returns it, and if He wills to withhold it, He withholds it."
The hadiths indicate, as far as I can see, that faith is established once or negated once. How is this reconciled with the verses that indicate the increase and decrease of faith? And what is the reasoning behind your citing the hadith of the fornicator's faith as evidence for the Hanafi position on this matter, that faith either exists or does not exist, especially since it appears to align with their position? May Allah reward you with good?

The Shaykh : Give me the paper... I do not remember if the first hadith is authentic or not, and it is I do not know this one...
'Aid 'Abassi: It is mawquf (stopping at a Companion) in any case.

The Shaykh : Not the mawquf, but the other one.
'Aid 'Abassi: ... from Abu Hurayrah.

The Shaykh : Is it authentic? Yes.
'Aid 'Abassi: ...

The Shaykh : And there is also a mawquf narration from Ahmad. What deserves a comment on this question, in my opinion, is the marfu' (traced to the Prophet) hadith mentioned by the questioner after the first mawquf hadith narrated from Abu Hurayrah. This is on the assumption that it is mawquf; I do not remember if that is authentic from Abu Hurayrah or not.
As for the second hadith, which is the statement from Abu Hurayrah, traced to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) This hadith is not a basis for those who hold that faith does not increase or decrease. I hope that the questioner and the listeners, all together, will be, or will try to be, among those about whom our Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) spoke in his saying It is necessary to look at the hadith with a sincere, unbiased view, free from supporting one school of thought over another. If this hadith, as the questioner assumes, supports the Hanafi position, do the Hanafis say that the fornicator who commits fornication becomes a disbeliever? The hadith itself does not say so, contrary to the questioner's assumption. They, the Hanafis themselves, and this is in fact what establishes the argument against them with their own words; they find no explanation for this hadith except in the manner of the majority of the righteous Salaf, who say that faith is not only in belief, but that righteous deeds are also included in it. From this comes their other correct belief that faith increases and decreases. This is explicit in the Noble Qur'an. Therefore, his saying (peace and blessings be upon him) in the mentioned hadith How do the Hanafis themselves interpret it? They said complete faith. Thus, faith has levels and degrees, and it includes decrease and increase. Their interpretation of the hadith is a support for the opinion of the majority, who say that faith increases and decreases, and that righteous deeds are part of the meaning of faith.
Once we know this fact and return to this hadith, it cannot be interpreted according to the position of the majority, who say that faith increases and decreases, nor according to the position of the Hanafis, who say that faith does not increase or decrease, but is a single reality.

The questioner : ... .

The Shaykh : Who is showing off? ... As for his saying When we look here at two terms, first "faith" and second "canopy," do we take the term "faith" in the static sense that does not accept increase or decrease? This is not said by the scholars of the Salaf, all of them. And here specifically, the Hanafis do not say it either, because if they did, "faith departed from him" would mean they adopted the view of the Khawarij, which is that committing a major sin is exiting the religion. And, praise be to Allah, the Hanafis do not hold this view. Therefore, they will be forced to interpret "faith" here in a manner similar to how they interpreted the other hadith That is, he is a believer with complete faith. Here, all of the faith departs from him, or rather, the complete faith that necessitates that he does not fall into such a sin departs. This is the first interpretation: to say that "faith" means complete faith, whereas the faith that saves one from eternal abode in the Fire on the Day of Resurrection is much less than that and saves one.
This term should be examined first to understand the hadith in the correct way. The other term is This does not mean that faith departed from him in a way of complete departure, even if we interpret faith as absolute faith, meaning that faith departed.
Now, the other term is This does not mean that faith departed from him in a way of complete departure, even if we interpret faith as absolute faith, meaning that the complete and deficient faith departed such that nothing of faith remained in his heart. Even if we interpret it this way, the hadith does not mean that this man's faith departed from him and he was completely separated from it, meaning that he died a spiritual death, i.e., that he became a disbeliever. No, because it departed from him and became attached to him like a canopy is attached to the one under it. The closest thing we can use to explain the attachment of faith in this state to the perpetrator of this crime is the departure of the soul from a person while he is sleeping. There is a difference between the soul departing from a person while he is sleeping, where he is still alive but his life is not the natural life of being awake, and the opposite of that, which is the soul departing from the human body finally, so that his body becomes like a piece of wood. Thus, we can distinguish between the complete departure of faith from a person, where he dies a spiritual death as the body dies when the soul separates from it completely, and dying a half-death or partial death, if that expression is correct, by the departure from the person of this complete faith that is not fitting for this criminal who committed fornication. Thus, this is a departure where faith is still attached to its owner, just as the soul remains attached to its owner in the state of the body's sleep, and the soul remains attached.
Thus, the complete faith departed from him, but it did not depart in an absolute way such that he had no connection to it. When he repented, as the wording says, and I think "when he repented" means faith returned to him. So, taking the hadith and studying it superficially and on the surface, first of all, is not the method of the scholars at all. There is no difference between them, between the Maturidiyyah, for example, and the Asha'irah, regarding the issue of faith, its increase or lack of increase.
And what does the questioner say about such an authentic hadith, which is more authentic than this one? Do we interpret it literally on the surface? No, there is no absolute faith. No one says this, neither a Hanafi nor a Shafi'i. Thus, there is no complete faith No, there is no complete religion, and so on.
Similarly, this hadith should be interpreted by observing first the complete faith, and an additional point, which is that it is like a canopy over him, not completely separated from him. Therefore, when he repents from the sin, this faith returns to its owner because it was not completely separated from him.
From this explanation and clarification, I believe the answer to the questioner’s question can be derived when I follow up on what came before by saying: Ahmad said, “Haddathana (narrated to us) ‘Abd al-Rahman ibn Mahdi, from Sufyan, from Ibrahim al-Muhajir, from Mujahid, from Ibn ‘Abbas, that he said to his young men: “Whoever among you wishes to marry, we will marry him. No one among you commits zina (unlawful sexual intercourse) except that Allah removes from him the light of faith. If He wills, He will restore it to him, and if He wills, He will withhold it from him.” Here, it is specified that what is removed is the light of faith, not faith itself, and this is self-evident. The questioner says that the previous hadiths indicate, as far as I can see, that faith is either affirmed once or denied once; it is affirmed once or denied once. So how do you reconcile these with the verses that indicate the increase of faith? We have already known, my brother, the answer: as long as faith increases and decreases, what is denied is complete faith, not the essence of faith. And I gave an example earlier that was very clear and there are many similar hadiths: “No complete faith.” Otherwise, if we took the hadiths and interpreted them as the questioner wants, we would abandon the methodology of the people of the Sunnah entirely, despite the differences among them regarding the increase and decrease of faith, and we would join the Khawarij, who declare Muslims disbelievers merely for committing some of the major sins.