The Shaykh’s remarks on shaving the beard.

The Shaykh : Rather, when a man imitates the most distinctive external characteristic of women, which is shaving the beard, and thereby imitates a woman, we must know that shaving this beard—I do not wish to enter into the topic of the ruling on the beard, for I believe you are aware of that—but I wish to draw attention to the fact that this sin which a man commits against himself when he shaves or trims his beard and imitates a woman, without doubt, will cause him to develop a nature of being preoccupied with trivial matters and neglecting the serious matters, because this is the nature of women, whom Allah (Mighty and Majestic) created to achieve a purpose in life, such as being a wife for this husband or this man, and that he finds tranquility in her and she finds tranquility in him. But Allah singled her out for a task and did not burden her with the task of men, as is well known, for example, that jihad is obligatory upon men and not women, and working outside the home is obligatory upon men and not women. And as it is said: "Killing and fighting are written for us, *** And for the women, the trailing of the veil". So this man who imitates the woman and shaves his beard, and may go further by completely removing the hair of his mustache, so that the resemblance between him and women is complete in general, and at that point we are not surprised by the hadith of Ibn Abbas, which the Imam al-Bukhari narrated in his Sahih from him, in which he said: And in another hadith, "May Allah curse the masculine women," which means the women who imitate men. Just as we observe in men who imitate women a certain softness and preoccupation with trivial matters that is not befitting for men, so we feel, indeed we perceive, in women who imitate men that they become bold and become like men in strength and manliness, forgetting their femininity and softness because of the imitation of men. All of this aligns with the fact that the external is connected to the internal. Therefore, what I want to conclude with is that we should always and forever not take lightly the rectification of the external appearance. Included in this is not only the imitation of men by women, but also the imitation of Muslims by disbelievers. And the tangible effect of this imitation is that this person who imitates the disbeliever no longer retains that Islamic dignity and strength that would carry him to fight the enemies of Allah (Mighty and Majestic), even if it is only intellectually, because he imitates them. And it is established in the philosophy of history, as discussed by the famous historian Imam Ibn Khaldun in his Muqaddimah, that the weak imitates the strong. This is a factual reality: the one who imitates the other is the weak one who imitates the strong. Therefore, it is not permissible for a Muslim to imitate the disbeliever, because he will take on the nature of this disbeliever, and at that point it is as if it is a preparation for the occupation of those lands by the disbelievers, whose customs those lands have found palatable, have taken lightly, and have even deemed permissible. So we should stand by the guidance of Islam in that the external, as the scholars say, is the title of the internal: "The external is only the title of the internal", due to the connection between the two in terms of soundness and weakness. And the most deserving of adhering to this Islamic guidance are the scholars, the students of knowledge, and the teachers among them, who are expected to be a good role model for the confused and lost Muslim community today, lost between the Muslims' ignorance of Islam and their imitation of the Westerners. It is upon us to understand our religion and to call people to act upon what is in it of guidance and light, so that it may be written for us with Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) the reward of those who follow us and those who take our example until the Day of Judgment, as He (peace and blessings be upon him) said in the authentic hadith: Perhaps this amount is sufficient, and praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds.