What is the criterion for excusing ignorance in tawhid (the oneness of Allah)?

The questioner : In the name of Allah, and praise is to Allah, and may peace and blessings be upon the Messenger of Allah. As for what follows: What is the criterion for excusing ignorance regarding tawhid (the oneness of Allah), and is reading and reciting the Qur'an sufficient to remove that excuse?

The Shaykh : First, the criterion—whether one is proficient in reading the Qur'an and understands it, or reads it but does not understand it, or is not proficient in either reading or understanding it—is that the Muslim lives in a correct Islamic environment where the beliefs are widespread to the extent that they become part of what is known from the religion by necessity, as the scholars of usul al-fiqh (the principles of jurisprudence) call it. Perhaps all those present remember the hadith of the girl who was grazing sheep for a man in al-Hudaybiyyah, and one day a wolf attacked the sheep. When the man was informed, he excused himself for what he had done by saying, "I am a human being; I get angry as humans do, and I struck her a blow." The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said, "And for him, a slave is to be set free." So the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) ordered him to bring her. He asked her, She said, "In the sky." He asked, She said, "You are the Messenger of Allah." He asked, The point of the hadith is that the belief that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) is in the sky is a Qur'anic belief explicitly stated in the Qur'an in more than one clear verse, and a Prophetic Sunnah belief supported by many hadiths. However, today, many Islamic societies do not hold this belief. The man living in such an environment is excused because the argument (hujjah) has not reached him. This is unlike the person in another society where the belief in tawhid (the oneness of Allah) is prevalent and widespread, resembling the first Prophetic society where the girl, who was a shepherd, knew this belief. Did she study the Qur'an? Did she study the hadith of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him)? That is usually unlikely for a shepherdess. But she lives with the family of her master and mistress, so she hears from them and learns jurisprudence at their hands, thus learning what she did not know before. If we add to this hadith and this meaning the saying of Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) and we understand this noble verse correctly, not with a rigid understanding of its wording without its intent and meaning, and I mean by that that the verse does not only mean, by the saying of Allah the Exalted that every group and every sect in every era is sent a Messenger. It may be that a Messenger is sent to them, or it may be that the call of the Messenger is sent to them. Therefore, the important point is that the verse does not mean only the person of the Messenger, but also the call of the Messenger. One of the proofs of this is that the Messenger may come to a people among whom there is a madman, an epileptic, a minor, a deaf person, and so on. These people had the Messenger come to them, but the call of the Messenger did not come to them. On the contrary, people like us, the followers of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him), Muhammad did not come to us directly, but the call of Muhammad came to us. Therefore, whoever the call of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) reaches in its purity and truth, the argument has reached him, and he is not excused by ignorance, as I clarified earlier. From here, I have said more than once that many Europeans and Americans are afflicted by deviant callers who deviate from the Book and the Sunnah. Let us take the Qadiyyah sect as an example, because these are among the sects that have very intense activity in calling to what they believe of their religion. Therefore, they have been able to influence thousands of thousands of English, German, American, and so on. And here is the point: Did the argument of Islam reach those who followed the Qadiyyah call? The answer is no. The call of the Qadiyyah reached them, not the argument of Islam. To Allah belongs the complete argument, which is the basis of obligation, both affirmative and negative. Therefore, the criterion is the reaching of the correct call to the individuals. Whoever it reaches, the argument is established against him; and whoever it does not reach, it is not. But what regulates the matter is observing the society in which these individuals live. If the society is a society of the people of the Sunnah and the community, as they used to say in the past, and we do not see the use of this word today, because in the custom of the followers of taqlid (following a scholar without knowing his evidence), it means the Asha'irah and the Maturidiyyah, and we mean those to whom the Salafi call has reached, and what was upon the righteous Salaf, then the argument is established against him. But in my opinion, these are few in the entire Islamic world. In my opinion, I think this is sufficient as an answer to your question.

The questioner : Do you allow us, our Shaykh?

The Shaykh : Please, go ahead.