What is the ruling on brothers visiting each other on the day of the festival? And is visiting graves on the day of the festival prescribed?

The questioner: LikewiseThe questioner : He said, "We have heard that people visiting each other on the day of the festival is an innovation. Please clarify the ruling regarding what was mentioned above concerning visiting brothers and what people do on the festivals?"

The Shaykh: We have said this repeatedly and over and over, and we are not in need of detailing what has been repeated, so we say briefly: Visiting the dead by the living on the day of the festival is among the newly invented matters, because it means restricting what the Lawgiver made general. The Wise Lawgiver said in the authentic hadith: .

The questioner : May Allah have mercy on you.

The Shaykh: So His saying: is a general command that is not permissible to restrict to a specific time or place, because restricting a text or making it general is not the function of people, but rather it is the function of the Lord of the Worlds, who tasked His noble Messenger and said to him: . So whatever text is general and is restricted, He clarified it; and whatever text is general and is specified, He specified it; and what is not, then it is not. So when He said: generally in all the days of the year, there is no difference between one day and another, and no difference between times in one day, morning or evening or noon, day or night, and so on. Likewise, we say that just as visiting the dead by the living on the day of the festival is restricted, so visiting the living by the living on the day of the festival is restricted, like visiting the dead by the living. The prescribed visitation on the day of the festival is what has been, unfortunately, abolished due to people rushing to perform the festival prayer in the mosques where they disperse, whereas it is obligatory for them all to gather in the prayer ground. The prayer ground is outside the town and accommodates all the people of the town. There they meet and pray the festival prayer and get to know each other naturally. This Sunnah, which the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) adhered to throughout his life, has been suspended. And here is a very important point we must be aware of: We all know the saying of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): . So although prayer in his mosque is worth a thousand prayers, he never prayed the festival of Fitr or the festival of Adha except outside this mosque, in the prayer ground. Why? Because he wanted to gather the Muslims in Medina from all places, from the villages around it, in one place that accommodates them all. These prayer grounds, over time, and with people moving away from first knowing the Sunnah of the Messenger (peace be upon him) and moving away from what remained with them of knowledge of the Sunnah of the Messenger (peace be upon him), and moving away from applying it and acting upon it, they were content to perform the festival prayer in the mosques, as they do with the Friday prayer and the five daily prayers. As for the Sunnah, the Messenger (peace be upon him) continued throughout his life to never pray the festival prayer in the mosque, not even once, but always prayed it in the prayer ground. Now, since a few years, some Muslims in such countries have returned to this Sunnah, the Sunnah of praying the festival prayer in the prayer ground. You must be hearing now that there are many prayer grounds where people pray instead of praying the festival prayer in the mosques. But they have one thing left, and perhaps this phenomenon I pointed to, of people leaving the mosques in the festival prayer to the prayer grounds, perhaps this phenomenon is a sign that a day will come when Muslims will gather in one place in one town in one prayer ground, as Muslims from all corners of the world gather in one town, which is Makkah and its surroundings of Mina, Muzdalifah, 'Arafah, and the like, with no alternative for them, even though they number in the millions. And however many people are in one town, they will never be unable to gather in a land with one prayer ground. Perhaps their leaving the mosques now to the prayer grounds is a herald of good that in the future, if Allah wills, when they understand the true meaning of his saying (peace be upon him): , and that it is the congregation that the Messenger (peace be upon him) gathered by his lawful means. One of those means is the single prayer ground, not the mosques, nor even the many prayer grounds in one town. So, this visitation or that is contrary to the Sunnah. The visitation is prescribed on the day of the festival, and that people come in their large crowds to the festival prayer in the prayer ground. And there is no doubt that people there will visit each other and get to know each other more than this traditional visitation, because when some of them visit others on the festival, they mostly visit those they know, but the opportunity for visitation during the year was not available to them, so they restricted this visitation to the day of the festival. Therefore, we said that visiting the dead by the living is not of the Sunnah at all, but is among the innovations, and likewise visiting the living by the living. And what does this mean? It must be that visitation, whether from the living to the dead, is not in the Sunnah once, and likewise visiting the living by the living is not in the Sunnah once, but rather it must continue, because in this visitation is the realization of visiting the living by the living, the realization of affection and getting to know each other among Muslims, as the Lord of the Worlds said: . As for visiting the dead by the living, it must also continue to achieve the purpose for which the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) commanded visiting graves after he had forbidden it, which is his saying (peace be upon him): , did you change it?

Another questioner: Peace be upon you.

The Shaykh: And upon you peace.