We request clarification of your statement that seeking nearness to Allah through the right of the prophets is not part of the creed?

The questioner : You mentioned in your book *Kashf al-Nuqat* that when you listed the seven letters, you said regarding the seventh that the Imam followed the Imam Abu Hanifah and his two companions in disliking seeking nearness to Allah through the right of the prophets and their status. Then you said that all of these seven points, meaning all seven, are from the creed, except the last one, which is the seventh that I am naming now, is not from the creed. So it is difficult for us to understand how it is not from the creed, and it is, meaning, seeking nearness to Allah through the right of the prophets?

The Shaykh : It is not from the creed unless something else is associated with it. Now, perhaps all the attendees know that the Imam al-Shawkani (may Allah have mercy on him) holds the permissibility of seeking nearness to Allah. Do you know that? Okay, meaning, do you think he associated partners with Allah?

The questioner : No, our Shaykh.

The Shaykh : He associated partners with Allah.

The questioner : He did not associate partners with Allah.

The Shaykh : You do not know.

The questioner : He did not associate partners with Allah. I say he did not associate partners with Allah.

The Shaykh : He did not associate partners with Allah, and praise be to Allah. So it has no connection to the creed. How can I tell you that if al-Shawkani sought nearness to Allah, or if someone is convinced by his seeking nearness or follows him, where he is unable to discern in his religion, if the one seeking nearness uses a created being as a means, this type of seeking nearness is of two kinds, not just one. One of them is what is intended in what you quoted or read, that it has no connection to the creed and to the oneness of Allah. If he seeks nearness following the text, in his claim, in his understanding, as a prescribed means, then there is no associating partners with Allah in it. All that is in it is an error, like any error among the jurisprudential errors, and unfortunately, they are in the hundreds, if not thousands. So any error in jurisprudence that occurs from any scholar, whether he is an independent legal reasoner or a follower, clearly has no connection to associating partners with Allah or to what contradicts the oneness of Allah. But if he believes that his seeking nearness through so-and-so has an effect on Allah (Mighty and Majestic), and this happens with many of the ignorant later generations, if he believes that his seeking nearness through so-and-so has an effect on Allah (Mighty and Majestic), here the seeking nearness moves from a branch to a principle. Is that clear? This is it.

The questioner : Clear. May Allah reward you with good.

The Shaykh : And you as well.

The questioner : Shaykh, when is the statement or action of a Companion considered a proof?

The Shaykh : In my opinion, if the action of a Companion is not contradicted by any of the Companions, and a fortiori, if it is not contradicted by a text from the Book or the Sunnah, it should not be contradicted. I do not say it is a proof, but it should not be contradicted because he is more knowledgeable and more learned than those who came after him. As for it being a proof, one person is not sufficient. Rather, as we said earlier, if the practice of the Salaf is established on something, then it is a proof. But one person does not constitute a proof. Rather, we prefer, and indeed we command, that a Muslim not be bold in contradicting a single Companion in what he held, unless he has evidence from the Book or from the Sunnah, or he has statements from some of the other Companions that contradict him. In that case, the statement of Abu Hanifah (may Allah have mercy on him), "They are men and we are men," applies. This is valid if the companions differed. But if there was no difference, if there was no difference, this needs explanation. Either it is known about a group of them that they were on a path and a way, so it is not permissible to contradict them. Or one of them has a statement, and we do not know anything about the others. Then we see holding to this statement, not from the standpoint of obligation, but from the standpoint of precaution.

The questioner : In a follow-up question to this question, Shaykh.

The Shaykh : Yes.

The questioner : Some scholars, in refuting the statement "and no one from the Companions is known to have contradicted him," say that Allah did not guarantee the preservation of the statements and differences of the Companions.

The Shaykh : This is correct speech. But if this is brought up, it does not refute my previous statement. It does not refute my previous statement because I said, let us assume we now reduce the number of Companions. The Companions are blessed in the thousands. We say there are ten of them. A statement came to us from one. You know my position on this statement, which is that we hold to it from the standpoint of precaution. But a statement came to us from two or three, and we do not know the position of the rest. We hold to this. It is true that our Lord did not guarantee [preservation], but it was transmitted to us, it was transmitted to us, and we knew it. And in that case, we took it as a path for us, based on the statement of the Exalted mentioned earlier: So the fact that our Lord did not guarantee its preservation, and the fact that the reality of the Companions is that statements from them were transmitted to us and are known, is another matter.