What is the ruling on calling the lands of disbelief the lands of emigration? What is the ruling on committing some of the forbidden acts on the pretext of dire necessity? And what is the criterion for dire necessity?

The questioner : The second question: As for the one who has...

Another questioner : If you please.

The questioner: Go ahead.

The questioner : The Lebanese brothers are governed by a disbelieving state.

The Shaykh : Yes, exactly.

Another questioner : So they faced many problems that forced them to emigrate so that they could live in freedom, and they are not able to emigrate to an Islamic country, for they are not permitted to emigrate to an Islamic country. So they were forced to emigrate to this country, where the rulers dealt with them, despite their disbelief, better than many of the rulers in the lands of Islam deal with their people. So I ask, how can they be blamed, and this is their reality?

The Shaykh : First, may Allah reward you. It is obligatory that we look at the community as a whole, not at individuals among them, such as the rulers, for example. And it is truly regrettable what you mentioned just now, that some disbelieving states exist in which the individual lives under their system with a material life happier than his material life under an Islamic state, as they say. But it is not hidden from everyone that what is known today, that the end justifies the means, is not of Islam in any way. The fact that the Muslim lives a difficult life materially, and conversely, lives a happy life in this regard in the lands of disbelief, does not justify for him to increase the number of the disbelievers and decrease the number of the Muslims. The Muslim rulers represent a very, very small number of individuals in relation to the Islamic society. Then, the emigration of Muslims to those lands is not within the limits of the dire necessity that you mentioned just now. For we have known for decades that America was called the land of emigration, and those who went there were not forced to do so to earn a good, ample living. They called themselves emigrants, and as a result, the place of their emigration was called the land of emigration. This is a reversal of the Islamic facts, which state that if a Muslim was a disbeliever before his Islam and lived with his disbelieving people, then Allah guided him and he embraced Islam, he must hasten to emigrate to the lands of Islam. How is it that we now reverse this Islamic system, so that we see that there is no harm in Muslims emigrating from their lands, whatever the state of their lands is in terms of their rulers? This is absolutely not permissible. As for dire necessities, they have their rulings, and dire necessities permit the prohibited. But I see something else on this occasion, which I do not think is hidden from all our brothers present, that they may include in the category of dire necessity what is not of it. That is, so that he does not fall into what would force him, he commits the violation. This is not hidden from you all. It is not dire necessity. Dire necessity is when a person falls between two evils and must choose one of them. Then it is said to him, "dire necessities permit the prohibited," based on the saying of Allah the Exalted: As for me, out of fear that I will fall into poverty, or out of fear that I will be harmed, I violate the Shari'ah and emigrate to the lands of disbelief. Or, for example, I collect haram wealth so that I do not fall into hardship in living. This is not of dire necessity in any way at all. As for the Lebanese or others you mentioned, I believe they did not fall into dire necessity, because we know that the Lebanese live in many Arab countries. What is the difference between those who were forced to emigrate from Lebanon because of the trials and fighting in it, and were forced to emigrate to the lands of the Muslims, and those who emigrated to the lands of disbelief and misguidance? There is no difference between these and those. The only difference is that the group that emigrated to the lands of Islam violated the Shari'ah, whereas those did not violate the Shari'ah. And we are not now looking into intentions, what those who were forced to leave Lebanon for the Arab countries intended, and what those who were forced to leave the Lebanese lands for the disbelieving countries intended. That is their account with Allah the Mighty and Majestic. But we say that those who emigrated to the lands of Islam did not fall into violation. And conversely, those who emigrated to the lands of disbelief have violated. It may be said that some of them were forced. We say, Allah knows about them. If they were so, then Allah the Mighty and Majestic is Forgiving and Merciful. As for opening the door to permitting emigration to the lands of disbelief and misguidance on the ruling of dire necessity, first, and second, people are not jurists and are not careful in defining the meaning of dire necessity, so that they are truly responsive to the ruling of the Shari'ah in their adherence to the principle that dire necessities permit the prohibited. This is all I have, and Allah knows best.