A question from a British Muslim - residing in England - regarding migration from the lands of disbelief to the lands of Islam?

The questioner :
I want to ask a question about Hijra. As a British Muslim, my government does not give me any trouble. I am actually living in England, and there are no problems with going to the mosques to pray. There are no problems for me with work or anything else. The only problem comes from the people themselves.
I have five children, Alhamdulillah, and I came here because I thought it would be safer for my children to actually be here.
What I want to know is that as a Muslim living in a country which is not predominantly Muslim, is that still Hijra, or is it incumbent on me? Can I travel anywhere in the world at this time?
Part of the reason I am asking this question is that it is good to be here as a Muslim, but I feel that there is da'wah for me as a Muslim outside of this country.

Another questioner : [Translation of the question]: The question of the noble brother regarding the topic of migration; he lives in the non-Muslim country of Britain, and the British government does not place any obstacles before him regarding prayer or going to the mosque. There are some mosques, but he asks regarding his children—Muslims, praise be to Allah, Lord of the Worlds—whether he must migrate from those lands to these lands for the sake of the legal rulings in these lands, or whether he remains a Muslim in those lands, goes to the mosque, prays, and calls to Islam in those lands?

The Shaykh : This is an important question, especially for one who was a disbeliever, then Allah guided him and he embraced Islam.
And we say frankly: It is obligatory for every Muslim in all the vast lands of Allah, if Allah guides him to Islam after he was a disbeliever, to migrate from that land to a Muslim land where the rulings of Allah (Mighty and Majestic) are established. Because the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) used to say: . He (peace and blessings be upon him) points in this authentic hadith to what the Arabs were upon before Islam, especially the Bedouins among them; where each of them would light a fire in front of his tent. So he (peace and blessings be upon him) said that a Muslim should have his dwelling far from the dwelling of the polytheist; such that if each of them lit a fire in front of his tent, the fire of one would not be visible to the other due to the distance between them. This is the meaning of his (peace be upon him) saying: . And in another hadith: ; meaning: whoever mixes with him in his body, his dwelling, and his dealings, and that is predominant over him, is like him in misguidance. Even if the degree of misguidance differs, just as that is the case with faith. Just as faith has degrees, so misguidance has degrees. So whoever associates with the polytheist is like him.
Then he (peace and blessings be upon him) confirmed that with a phrase containing severe awe; namely his (peace and blessings be upon him) saying: . The reason for that from the psychological aspect is that nature is a thief, especially that it steals evil and does not absorb good except with difficulty. And the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) pointed to this reality in some authentic hadiths, among them his (peace and blessings be upon him) saying: —meaning: it gives to you for free—, . He (peace and blessings be upon him) means that if a Muslim mixes with righteous people, he will inevitably acquire from them. The lowest degree of acquisition in this example is that he smells a good and pleasant scent from them. And conversely; he (peace be upon him) said: . In brief, this hadith means that the companion is a dragger; the companion is a dragger; if he is righteous, he drags his neighbor to good, and if he is bad and corrupt, he drags his neighbor to evil.
Then the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) narrated for us a real example of what happened in some nations before us. He said (peace and blessings be upon him): —meaning: he was directed to a worshipper, but he was ignorant, not a scholar—; —here is the point—; ; considering that the scholar advised him with that, . Each claims that it is his right. The angels of punishment know from his life the widespread evil; therefore they see that they should take charge of seizing his soul. And the angels of mercy see, as the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) said in another hadith: . And this is a man who went out repentant to his Lord, so it is our right, we the angels of mercy, to take charge of seizing his soul, .
The point of this authentic hadith—and it is in "the two Sahihs," al-Bukhari and Muslim—is: that this noble scholar knew that this man, whose boldness had reached the point of killing ninety-nine souls before, then completed the number with that ignorant worshipper; so the killers he killed became one hundred without right. This scholar points out that this soul that commands evil only helped him in that because of the environment in which he lived, and in which he spent the greater part of his life. Therefore, he advised him to move from that evil town to the righteous town.
The hadiths that confirm this reality that the environment affects a person, whether for good or for bad, are... And among the wonders is that the environment affects from the moral and faith aspect just as it affects from the medical aspect. People today, in particular, are concerned with purifying the environment from everything that affects physical health. And medicine today is based on a foundation that the Shari'ah approves, and indeed it came before medicine, which is medical quarantine. And its meaning is that a person must, above all, choose a healthy climate that helps him to maintain his health, and not move to an infected land. This is what people today care about greatly and very greatly.
As for the moral aspect and considering a righteous environment; this is what only Muslims, in particular, care about, and some of the other people of other religions, very few. Therefore, one who resides among the polytheists may be affected greatly and very greatly by this residence. And I have touched this with my hand in my travels in some lands, after I believed in it with faith in the unseen for what we read to you of some authentic hadiths. The summary is that the atmosphere surrounding a person, if it is righteous, affects the citizen or resident in that atmosphere with good, otherwise it affects him with evil. I touched this effect with my hand. And among what happened to me is that it was decreed for me to travel to Britain itself, and I traveled in some of its lands. And the time was then the month of Ramadan. It was said to me that there is in a town far from London about two hundred kilometers an Islamic community of Indians or Pakistanis, and that there is upon it a noble person committed to the Book and the Sunnah. So we went to that village, and we sat at the iftar table. And indeed I saw the man as he was described to me. But his appearance troubled me; for his appearance is British, not the appearance of Muslims. And that is because he was wearing a jacket and trousers with this knot, the "tie." And while we were sitting or breaking our fast, we spoke about some religious issues. So I drew his attention to this attire of his, which is not the attire of the Pakistanis known in all lands, especially that he tied this knot on his neck. And from the favor of the man is that he responded to the advice after I mentioned to him some hadiths that forbid Muslims from imitating the disbelievers. Among them is his (peace and blessings be upon him) saying: . And I had barely finished this sermon with that noble man when he hastened and untied the knot from his neck, and threw it to the ground. So I thanked him for that.
However, just as much as I was pleased by his actual response to my advice, I was distressed by his subsequent explanation for wearing the tie—and here is the point. He said: "I did this because the people of this land—meaning the English—look at our Palestinian brothers with hatred and malice. And the fashion of the Palestinians is that they do not wear a tie, but rather unbutton the top button, and perhaps the one below it a little, so that some of the neck is visible. That is what he told me there. So, when the English look at this type of Muslim with contempt, my companion said: 'So, in order for these people not to look at us with that same gaze, we wore this tie.' I said to him, regretfully: 'I wish you had not spoken! Because this excuse—as it is said—is worse than the sin, or uglier than the sin. You are concerned with the gaze of the disbelievers toward your Muslim brothers, a gaze of contempt, so you respond to this gaze, and you want those people not to look at you with that same gaze. This unites you with the Palestinians, with whom you share faith and the oneness of Allah, and separates you from the English, among whom you reside, who are characterized by disbelief, associating partners with Allah, and misguidance."
This is one of many stories that indicate that the environment has its effect, and this is very, very clear. Indeed, we find that some of the people of this land—as we see you, and praise be to Allah—are all dressed in Arab and Islamic attire. But when some of them travel to those Western lands, their personality changes radically. They take off this turban, and take off the cap, and put on the jacket and trousers, and tie the tie, and become a person as if he is not a Muslim.
This indicates, at the very least, that he does not take pride in his religion, and consequently does not take pride in his people and their customs. Therefore, it is not permissible for a Muslim to imitate the disbelievers. And we know that the one who lives in the lands of the disbelievers, even if he was a disbeliever before, cannot rid himself of the effects of that evil environment except by completely detaching himself from it and traveling to the lands of the Muslims.
Therefore, it came in the Noble Qur'an that when the angels take the soul of a disbeliever who did not migrate to the lands of Islam and did not believe in Islam, . So, migration is a recommended practice followed from ancient times, and the secret behind it is that the Muslim is able to preserve his religion.
And it is a very, very, very grave error today for Muslims to call some Muslims who travel from the lands of Islam to other lands that are not an Islamic state, nor Islamic lands, such as America, "migrants." This is a reversal of the legal truth. The migrant, first of all, is—as he (peace and blessings be upon him) said in some authentic hadiths—; .
And these people who travel—and I do not say migrate—from the lands of Islam to the lands of the disbelievers have done the opposite of the Shari'ah. The Shari'ah, as we said in this speech, commands the disbelievers to migrate from their lands to the lands of Islam. So, unfortunately, this truth has been reversed for some Muslims. They called their travel from the lands of Islam to the lands of disbelief "migration." But migration is only from the lands of disbelief to the lands of Islam, or in some cases, migration is from the lands of disbelief to another disbeliever land; but the religious freedom there is better than that.
As for the lands of Islam, they exist now—praise be to Allah. Therefore, whoever has a true Islam, it is obligatory for him to leave his disbeliever homeland and migrate to his Muslim homeland. Because the Muslim's homeland is all the lands of Islam, and there is no tribalism among Muslims or adaptation to a specific region. So, in whatever land the Muslim settles, it is his land. And by that, he preserves his Islam, from the perspective of the one who recently embraced Islam, and from another perspective, he develops and nourishes it, and is able to raise himself and his family with other Islamic morals. We have always spoken about the Muslims who reside in the lands of disbelief: where do they learn Islam? They cannot learn Islam and its rulings, how to mix, how to treat his wife, how to treat his children, how to treat his neighbors, and how to correct his creed above all else. He cannot do that except by migration. Therefore, the Shari'ah, by Book and Sunnah, commands the Muslim to migrate from the lands of disbelief to the lands of Islam.
This is what I have in answer to this question.