Questions regarding the beliefs of Abdullah al-Habashi and the ideas he spreads among the common people?

The questioner : In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. Our Shaykh, some of the Habashis who are students of Abdullah al-Habashi have approached some of the women of this country through the fitrah (innate natural disposition). For example, they ask them, "Who created the place?" The women answer, "Allah." Then this Habashi asks, "Is it permissible that Allah, the Creator of the place, is inside this place?" The woman answers, "Of course not." He then says to her, "If so, Allah is not limited by anything; He is not above, nor below, nor in front, nor behind, nor on the right, nor on the left." He also says that the hand commonly known is the limb found among humans, and it is impossible for the Creator of humans, the Lord of all creatures, to have such a hand. Please advise us, may Allah reward you with good.

The Shaykh : I wish it were a fitrah-based approach! All praise is due to Allah; we praise Him, seek His help, seek His forgiveness, and take refuge in Allah from the evil of our souls and the badness of our deeds. Whom Allah guides, none can mislead, and whom He leaves to mislead, none can guide. And I bear witness that there is no deity but Allah alone, with no partner, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His slave and His Messenger. As for what follows, the best of speech is the speech of Allah, the best of guidance is the guidance of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him and his family), and the worst of matters are their innovations, and every innovation is a religious innovation (bid'ah), and every religious innovation is misguidance, and every misguidance is in the Fire. Before I begin answering this question, I reassure all Muslims, those present and those absent, men and women, that Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) is free from being in any place. This is because when the word "place" is used, it refers to what was non-existent until Allah (Mighty and Majestic) created it and made it a place for these various creatures, including humans, jinn, and angels. However, this word is thrown around by those people, who are known to scholars as reviving a bad practice from the science of kalam (theology) based on reason. I wish this reason were a unified reason among all people, among the Muslims and the disbelievers, among the righteous Muslims and the wicked. I wish this reason were unified so that it would be valid for every person of sound mind to refer to it for judgment. But since minds differ greatly, it is a great foolishness for these people who claim to belong to Islam, whether sincerely or not—and their reckoning is with Allah—to judge by their minds. If reason were unified, they would have some excuse for judging by their minds. But since minds differ, as we said, and I will not repeat the details, between the righteous and the wicked, and now I say another distinction: the mind of a knowledgeable person differs completely from the mind of an ignorant person. I do not mean knowledgeable in the Shari'ah, but I mean knowledgeable in any science. The mind of one who is knowledgeable in a certain science differs completely from the mind of one who is not knowledgeable in that science. For example, a rational doctor cannot be matched in his mind and knowledge by one who is not a doctor, and vice versa. One who is knowledgeable in physics or chemistry cannot be matched by one who is knowledgeable in medicine. And so we say, in the end, in the final analysis, the rational person who is knowledgeable in the Book and the Sunnah cannot be like the rational person who is ignorant of the Book and the Sunnah. And the matter is more important than this classification and detail: the rational person who is knowledgeable in the Book and the Sunnah and follows the methodology of the righteous Salaf cannot have a mind like the mind of that man who relies on his own mind to understand the Book and the Sunnah and does not refer in his understanding to what the righteous Salaf were upon. So here, at the end of this classification, there are two people knowledgeable in the Book and the Sunnah, but one relies in his understanding of the Book and the Sunnah on the Salafi reports that go back first to the early Companions of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him and his family), and then to those who followed them with excellence until the Day of Judgment. This one, who relies on the Book and the Sunnah and this Salafi methodology, his mind differs completely from that other man who relies on the Book and the Sunnah but relies on his own understanding of them, not on the understanding of the Salaf. These people, the modern scholars of kalam or the ancient scholars of kalam, they all judge by their minds. I wish their minds relied only on the Book and the Sunnah, not like the first group who rely on the Book and the Sunnah and the methodology of the righteous Salaf. I do not know if this place requires me to pause, I hope briefly, to distinguish between the two men: the first who relies on the Book and the Sunnah and the methodology of the righteous Salaf, and the other who relies on the Book and the Sunnah without bending his head, mind, and understanding to what our righteous Salaf were upon. Perhaps this does not need clarification, or does it seem that the matter needs some clarification? Yes.

The questioner : In my opinion, it does not need it.

The Shaykh : Is that so in your opinion?

The questioner : It does not need it.

The Shaykh : It does not need it. Good. If this distinction is clear in the minds of our brothers present and our sisters present and absent, if this is clear, then I say this is a philosophy we know from Akhzam: "A style we know from Akhzam." When they rely on kalam, and I do not say on reason after that detail, but only on their own minds, they want to free Allah (Mighty and Majestic) from being in a place, and He is free from being in a place by the ruling of the statement of Allah (Mighty and Majestic):