Are the differences among Islamic groups, both past and present, in the fundamentals or in the branches?

The questioner : Regarding the differences among the groups of the Sunnah, are they differences in the fundamentals of Islamic creed, or differences—for example—in... various...

The Shaykh : Pardon me so that I can answer; what do you mean by the people of the Sunnah? I mean, in the past?

The questioner : In the past and in the present, meaning those who exist...

The Shaykh : It is a bit difficult to answer this question without first clarifying.

The questioner : May Allah reward you with good if you clarify the matter...

The Shaykh : I say: In the past, it was known among scholars and jurists that the people of the Sunnah had three schools of thought, and all these schools belong to the Sunnah regardless of their correctness or error, but the inquiry is in terms of affiliation. So these schools are three in creed and four in the branches. The three schools related to creed are the school of the people of hadith, which is the one we adopt and we are not satisfied with any alternative; the second school is the school of the Maturidiyyah, and the third school is the Asha'irah or the Ash'aris.
As for the jurisprudential issues, you all know there are four, naturally from the people of the Sunnah: the Hanafi and Maliki schools... they belong to the Sunnah in the general sense, first by affiliation and then by adoption, except for those known by various names, all of which end in acting according to the hadith and the Sunnah. In India and Pakistan, they are called, for example, the people of hadith; in Egypt, they are called the supporters of the Sunnah; in Syria and here, they are called the Salafis. These people explicitly belong to the Sunnah and do not adopt one of these specific schools because they know that in every school there is from the Sunnah and the hadith what is not found in the other schools. So if they affiliate with one school, they may miss some of the good that exists in the other schools, except in what relates to creed, where they adhere to the school of the people of hadith, the people of the Sunnah, led by Imam Ahmad (may Allah have mercy on him); because the people of hadith, in what relates to creed, understand the Book and the Sunnah according to the methodology of the righteous Salaf, unlike the other schools we mentioned earlier, the Maturidiyyah and the Asha'irah. So they do not adopt this style or this methodology in understanding the Book and the Sunnah; that is, they do not say, neither by affiliation nor by adoption, that we are on the methodology of the righteous Salaf in understanding the verses and in understanding the hadiths. Rather, some of them said a word we wished they had not said—and it is a famous, accepted word among them, with no doubt in it, unfortunately—where they said: "The school of the Salaf is safer, and the school of the Khalaf is more knowledgeable and more wise."
So this detail does not apply to today; why? Because if you take the issue from the first aspect—that is, in what relates to creed—you rarely find someone who tells you: I am an Ash'ari, or I am a Maturidi; you do not find someone who says this; why? Because—very unfortunately—creed is no longer taught comprehensively in schools, but in universities, only in scattered fragments, and if it is taught, it usually varies according to the countries where those universities are located. For example, in the Maghreb—the entire Maghreb—starting from Libya, for example, ending in Morocco; they teach the Ash'ari creed. Likewise, for example, in Egypt, while in the Turkish countries, for example, and many of the lands of the non-Arabs in the past, they study the Maturidi school. But today, these specializations have been lost for the reason I mentioned earlier. Also, it has been lost for a common person to say: I am a Hanafi, or a Shafi'i, or a Maliki, or a Hanbali, except very rarely; why? Because—also—fiqh is no longer taught in universities as fiqh used to be taught in the past in the scholarly circles in the mosques. Rather, as we see now, so-and-so is a doctor, a graduate with a degree in Shari'ah, but he did not study except a few scattered issues related to fiqh; because the previous method, which was more beneficial and fruitful, the method of the circles, is no longer present in the mosques, unfortunately. So what remains in the field today is only those who explicitly belong to the Sunnah in methodology; whether in creed or in fiqh.
As for the old schools, they are, as I mentioned earlier, three in creed: the people of hadith, the Maturidis, and the Ash'aris. And fiqh, as you know today, all these schools, without doubt, there is no school among them that disavows the Sunnah or acting according to the hadith. And this is a point that must actually be noted; because if we imagine a Muslim who says: I do not act according to the hadith; then he has left the community of Muslims; because the hadith is what enables the scholar to understand the words of Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He); and thus he (peace and blessings be upon him) confirmed this meaning in the famous hadith: ; so there is no Muslim who says: I do not accept the hadith. But there are Muslims by the thousands, indeed by the millions, who do so in practice and not in belief. And they may find for themselves excuses that may be an excuse before Allah (Mighty and Majestic) and that may not be; for example, many of the graduates of the colleges of Shari'ah do not respond to some of the Salafi calls that invite all Muslims to act according to what is established in the Sunnah and not to adhere to a specific school; because that is what the Qur'an and the Sunnah ordered first, and then what the imams of fiqh ordered second. Why do they not take this stance with the majority calling to act according to the Book and the Sunnah? They tell you: We do not have the ability or the energy; it requires knowledge of the Book and the Sunnah, knowledge of the principles of hadith, knowledge of the principles of fiqh, and so on. This is, of course, a long discussion, and we have many answers to it.
But the intention now is to say that what exists in the arena today, there are no explicit people calling to act according to the Book and the Sunnah except those who belong to acting according to the hadith and the Sunnah. As for the others, each is satisfied with what he studied, or what he did not study; if he studied the Maturidiyyah, he is a Maturidi, and this prevails among the Turks, meaning those who are completely fanatical for the Maturidiyyah in creed, and for the Hanafis in the branches. As for the masses of people, as they say in our Syria: "Put out your hand and walk," he does not know if he is a Hanafi or a Shafi'i; and therefore we find many of the imams of the mosques, from one side you see him praying as if he is a Shafi'i, from another side you see him as if he is a Hanafi; who is he? As they also say in our place, he is a "Hanafshafi'i"; meaning mixed from here and from there; meaning, for example, you find an imam who raises his hands, and insists on the qunut in the Fajr prayer as if it is one of the obligations, but he does not sit in the tawruk position in the tashahhud, he always sits in the iftirash position, iftirash, even though this is the school of Imam al-Shafi'i first, and what Imam al-Nawawi particularly encouraged in his great book "al-Majmu' Sharh al-Muhadhdhab"; he pointed out that it is obligatory to pay attention to this sitting in the tawruk position, and perhaps he included with it the sitting of rest, and this—also—they do not do. So you do not know if this is a Hanafi because he does not sit in the tawruk position and does not sit in the sitting of rest, but he is convinced that raising the hands is a sunnah, or he raises them, or the opposite of that; he is a Shafi'i and raises them by following his school, but he does not sit in the tawruk position and does not sit in the sitting of rest... the people.
I do not know if I answered you about what you asked?

The questioner : May Allah reward you with good.

The Shaykh : But if there are things that need clarification, there is no objection.