Is it true that the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) was the first of Allah’s creation among humans, and is it true of what is said about the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him), “If Satan had seen the radiance of his light on Adam’s face, he would have been the first to prostrate…”

The Shaykh : Is it true that the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) was the first of Allah’s creation among humans, and is it true of what is said about the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) “If Satan had seen the radiance of his light on Adam’s face, he would have been the first to prostrate…”? This is the first time I have heard this misguidance. The questioner says he heard it from the reciters. What is the ruling on recitation and praise with this?
As for the first question, the answer is that it is not true that the Messenger (may Allah’s prayers and peace be upon him) was the first of Allah’s creation among humans. This is because it is one of the matters of the unseen (ghayb) in which it is not permissible for a Muslim to speak based on conjecture. Allah (Mighty and Majestic) says in His Book: And the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) says: So if a person says, “Allah (Mighty and Majestic) first created what we call the person Muhammad,” or rather, as they claim, He created the light of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him and his family), we say: Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) said: So how does this claimant, who shoots in the dark regarding the unseen, know that the Messenger (peace be upon him) was the first thing Allah created, namely His light? He will then cite the aforementioned hadith: “The first thing Allah created was the light of His Prophet”. We say: This hadith has no basis in the six famous mother books, nor in the other known books among the people of hadith, nor in any of the hundreds of other books. This hadith has no basis except in the minds of the ignorant among those who have made praising the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) with truth and falsehood a profession from which they earn their living. It is not permissible, according to many scholars, to establish a belief based on a valid hadith. These scholars stipulate that for establishing a belief, the hadith must be mass-transmitted (mutawatir); it is not sufficient for it to be merely valid (sahih). That is, even if it has two or three chains, it must have come from twenty chains, meaning twenty Companions, for the belief to be established by that hadith. Although we do not adopt this opinion, because we do not distinguish between what came to us from the Messenger (peace be upon him) regarding belief and what came from him regarding rulings—all of which must be followed and submitted to—we mention that many scholars, when they stipulated mass-transmission for a hadith intended to establish a belief, did so only out of concern that a Muslim might believe something in which some of the narrators may have erred. Unfortunately, we find that the masses of people today believe in beliefs based on weak hadiths, or even fabricated hadiths, such as this hadith: “The first thing Allah created was the light of your Prophet, O Jabir”. Therefore, it is not permissible for a Muslim to believe in such a belief because it is not found in any of the valid hadiths. As for the aforementioned verse, there is no doubt that it is misguidance, and it is not permissible to recite it, let alone praise the Messenger (may Allah’s prayers and peace be upon him) with it. Because praising a man with falsehood is actually a criticism of him, whether the reciter intends it or not. Because if you praise a person with what is not in him, it is as if you are implying that he does not possess the true praises that exist in him, to the extent that we need to praise him with them. Therefore, we fabricate things from ourselves to praise him with. The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) is not like that. Allah (Mighty and Majestic) chose him with his prophethood and messengership and created him with perfect character, and He said: So he (may Allah’s prayers and peace be upon him) does not need to be praised with these falsehoods, especially since there is a portion of the valid Sunnah that is abundant, and a portion that is less so, all of which is valid. A Muslim can praise the Messenger (peace be upon him) with all of that. But to come with this false praise, this is exaggeration in religion. Allah (Mighty and Majestic) warned us by warning the People of the Book against exaggeration in religion, and He said: And he (may Allah’s prayers and peace be upon him) directed this same meaning to us, the Muslims, directly. This was when he was near Mina and ordered Abdullah ibn Abbas to pick up pebbles for him, indicating that they should be small, the size of a chickpea, and he said: So this exaggeration in religion is not permissible at all, especially what is related to belief and the matters of the unseen, such as this claim made by this reciter: “If Satan had seen the radiance of his light on Adam’s face, he would have been the first to prostrate”. This is the speech of poets whom the misguided follow. If such recitation is not permissible at all, it is because the speech, utterance, and vocalization of it are not permissible because it is false. Therefore, the Messenger (peace be upon him) warned the Muslims not to yield to praising the Messenger (peace be upon him), even within the bounds of reality, for fear that it would lead them to such false speech. He (peace be upon him) said: “Do not praise me as the Christians praised Jesus, the son of Mary.” On this occasion, it must be remembered that this hadith does not mean, as some commentators state, “Do not exaggerate in praising me.” No, rather, it means “Do not praise me at all,” because he does not need to be praised. This is because the Christians went astray and reached the point of making Jesus the son of Allah because they opened the door to praising Jesus (peace be upon him). We all know that “Most of the fire comes from the smallest of sparks”. Satan, in his deception of man, does not suddenly strike with great calamities and major matters, because that would alert his enemy, man, and he would not fall into the trap of Iblis. Rather, he comes to him step by step. So, to block the means (sadd al-dhara'i'), he (peace be upon him) said: “Do not praise me at all” “It is sufficient for you to say” . And evidence for what I said is that the scholars of hadith, including Imam al-Tirmidhi, cited this hadith in his book *Al-Shama'il al-Muhammadiyyah* under the chapter “The Humility of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family).” If Imam al-Tirmidhi had understood this hadith to mean “Do not exaggerate in praising me,” this meaning would not have been connected to the chapter, meaning the hadith would not have been a heading for the chapter, because this does not indicate humility. It is obligatory for any person to tell people, “Do not praise me with falsehood.” This is not humility. But humility is when the hadith is understood on its apparent meaning: “Do not praise me at all.” This is humility. Why, O Messenger of Allah, when you are worthy of being praised? Because opening this door may lead you to falling into what the Christians fell into regarding praise. And this is actually observed today among Muslims. And this is the verse of poetry before you now, from many, many verses of the poem by al-Busiri and others.
"For from Your generosity is the world and its neighbor, *** And from Your knowledge is the knowledge of the Tablet and the Pen"
This is praise, but this is disbelief (kufr), because the Messenger (peace be upon him) heard a slave girl in his time saying, “We have a Prophet who knows what is in tomorrow,” and he said: So how would it be if the Messenger (peace be upon him) heard from al-Busiri: “And among your knowledge is the knowledge of the Tablet and the Pen”? There is no doubt that it is misguidance that the Messenger (peace be upon him) would not approve of, contradicting the Book, the Sunnah, and the consensus of the Ummah. So, cutting off the root of these exaggerations is that the Muslim does not open the door of praise, especially in these anthems, and is content with reading what is established in the biography (Seerah) regarding the character of the Messenger (peace be upon him), his miracles, and his manners, by which these hearts were opened, which were blind hearts.
In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. It was narrated from Abdullah ibn al-Shakhr that he said: “I set out with the delegation of Banu Amir to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), and we said, ‘You are our master.’ He said, (peace and blessings be upon him) We said, ‘And we are the most excellent in virtue and the greatest in lineage.’ He said, It was narrated by Abu Dawud with a good chain. What does the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) intend by his saying ? That is, the Messenger (peace be upon him) by his saying means that when they said to the Messenger (peace be upon him), ‘You are our master,’ he said to them, (peace and blessings be upon him) meaning that the true master is Allah. And when they said to him, ‘You are the most excellent of us and the greatest of us in lineage,’ or ‘the most excellent of us in virtue,’ he said to them, (peace and blessings be upon him) meaning: Do not open up for yourselves the door of deviation from the straight path by exaggerating in praising the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) and magnifying him, for Satan will drag you to paths that deviate from the straight path, as he said, (peace and blessings be upon him) Likewise, the Messenger (peace be upon him) points by his saying to the hadith narrated by Abdullah ibn Mas’ud, who said: “We were sitting with the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) when he drew a straight line on the ground, then drew short lines around it, then the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) recited while extending his finger over the straight line: So, exaggerating in praising the prophets and the righteous is one of the ways by which Satan drags those who exaggerate in praise to the short paths and takes them out of the straight path, which is the single path with no second. This is the intended meaning of his saying, (peace and blessings be upon him) In terms of usul (principles of jurisprudence), the Messenger (peace be upon him), with this phrase, by his saying , established the principle of sadd al-dhara'i' (blocking the means to harm). He prohibits exaggeration in praise for fear that it will lead to impermissible speech, as the Christians did.