Did you meet our Shaykh, Shaykh Taki al-Din al-Nabhani, and discuss with him?

Al-Halabi : Our Shaykh, regarding Taki al-Din al-Nabhani, did you meet him?

The Shaykh : Ah, how could I not.
Al-Halabi : And did you discuss with him?

The Shaykh : I met him, unfortunately, and strange things happened between us that you would not believe. We were eager to meet with him, and some of the enthusiastic young men went from Damascus to Beirut, where he was residing. They said to him, "O Shaykh Taki al-Din, the disagreement among scholars divides the youth. If you met withThe Shaykh : al-Albani, it would be better for these young people." In short, they spoke to him about this matter. He excused himself, saying he could not enter Damascus at the time. As you know, he had political activity and was being monitored by almost all the countries. The point is, I said I would send someone to represent me, and indeed, he sent me a person from Tripoli, a Lebanese from the group. In truth, he was well-groomed; most members of the Tawhid Party are shaven, but he had grown his beard and kept it. He came to my shop, and he brought with him, if you know him, Abu Hamdi al-Jazairi. Did you see him at my place the last time?

The questioner: Yes.

The Shaykh : Ah, he has a brother named Abd al-Rahman al-Maliki. I do not know if they are brothers on their father's or mother's side; they are not siblings. He had a party inclination. He was raised among us and attended our lessons, Abd al-Rahman al-Maliki. Later, when the call of the Tawhid Party reached Damascus, he began attending their circles and was greatly influenced. In any case, he introduced me to him at my shop. We agreed that he would come to my place every day for a few hours and we would discuss. We established a methodology for this, and the meetings actually began for two or three days, and then they stopped. We called Abd al-Rahman and asked him, "Where is your friend?" He said, "By Allah, he is excusing himself from coming because he feels he is being monitored by the Syrian intelligence." We said, "That is good." But I remained eager for a meeting, a meetingThe Shaykh : One day, while I was in the shop, the phone rang. "Peace be upon you." "And upon you peace. Who is it?" "Your friend, Mahmoud al-Ashtnabuli." He said, "Come, get ready." We said, "Good." He said, "We have arranged a time to meet withThe Shaykh : Taki al-Din al-Nabhani." We said, "May Allah reward you. How?" He said to us, "A friend of mine up in the Kurdish quarter is the imam of a mosque. I went to him and said, 'My brother, can you get us an appointment withThe Shaykh : Taki al-Din? There are young men there who want to meet him and benefit from his company.' The imam promised well, and indeed, he calledThe Shaykh : Taki al-Din and got an appointment from him. I remember clearly it was a Monday, after the 'Asr prayer, at a mosque up in the Kurdish quarter. The appointed day came, and we prayed 'Asr there in the mosque. Among the worshippers were the editor of the magazine *al-Tamaddin al-Islami*, Muzaffar al-'Uzma, his secretary Muhammad Kamil al-Din al-Khatib, and the president of the Muslim Brotherhood at that time, or before Salah al-Din al-Shash. That is, a group of prominent people. We prayed 'Asr, and the people left, and we remained, four or five of us. One of them stood up and said, "He is here." By Allah, they stood up to welcome him at the mosque door, and I stood up with them at the end. Glory be to Allah, he was lifting his leg to enter the mosque, and I was facing him. I said, "I came with an excuse, Professor. We have an appointment and we are waiting for you," and so on. He said, "By Allah, I have a necessary, compelling matter, and I cannot come. Peace be upon you." "And upon you peace." The days passed, and the days came. Abd al-Rahman al-Maliki was still frequentingThe Shaykh : By Allah, they stood up to welcome him at the mosque door, and I was at the back with them. Glory be to Allah, he was lifting his leg to enter the mosque, and I had turned to face him. I said, "I have come with an excuse, Professor. We have an appointment, and we are waiting for you," and so on. By Allah, I had a pressing, unavoidable matter that I could not handle. I said, "Peace be upon you," and he replied, "And upon you be peace." Days passed and days came, and 'Abd al-Rahman al-Maliki is still frequenting what? Both groups: the Tahrir Party and the Salafis. Every time I see him, I say to him, "He has come."The Shaykh : both parties, the Tawhid Party and the Salafis. Every time I saw him, I would say to him, "Did he come?" Until he said to me, "He came." I said to him, "Get me an appointment with him." He said, "Okay." When the lesson time came, we asked him, "What happened?" He said, "By Allah,The Shaykh : he is excusing himself; he has no time." I said to him, "I am surprised by this excuse, because I know thatThe Shaykh : Taki al-Din has activity in calling to his party. If it is not like al-Albani's activity in calling to Salafism, it might be more. So, suppose I am one of those people who meets with him, so that he might see the truth of his call. He went and came back a second time and said he was excusing himself again. I said to him, "Tell the Shaykh that I do not accept this excuse. Tell him frankly that you meet with ordinary people, among them are commoners, students of knowledge, intellectuals, and so on. So, supposeThe Shaykh : al-Albani is one of these people, how would you see it?" He sent back the answer that he was excusing himself and that the first opportunity that allowed him, he would meet with al-Albani. His words were sweet; he said he was ready to meet and benefit fromThe Shaykh : me. At that time, I was not a Shaykh, by Allah. The days passed, and the days came, and I was surprised to see him enter my shop. "Peace be upon you." "And upon you peace." My shop had two sections: the external appearance was my watch shop, and the internal appearance was a bookstore. I used to enter my modest bookstore when I found myself free and had no external bookstore business. So, we sat, he and I, in this bookstore, and he repeated the same words to me: "Do not take me; my time is tight, and I am not prepared to sit with you and benefit from your knowledge and your virtue, and this kind of talk, and so on. We are ready to accept everything you have of knowledge or objection or anything, but if you would please write down your notes for us, we will look at them with consideration." The point is, he finished his speech by saying, "You write to us all your notes, and we will look at them with consideration and benefit from them." I said to him, "No, Professor. A believing person benefits and is benefited. Just as you want to benefit from what may be with me, I want to benefit from what may be with you. And this does not appear except through meeting. He keeps saying his time does not help him, and so on. Peace be upon you, and upon you peace. He ended the meeting like that. Among the things I mentioned to him, I said, "Professor, you remember that I wrote an article and sent it to you regarding your prohibition of renting land, and to this day I do not know if I was mistaken, and yet you did not clarify my mistake to me. If I was mistaken, I did not benefit from you at all. If I was correct, you truly benefited, but I did not know that. So, whether I was mistaken or correct, I should have benefited from you, because when you tell me I made a mistake in such-and-such, I retract it. When you tell me I was correct in what I wrote, I praise Allah for that and am encouraged to continue in what I am doing. So, to this day, and years have passed since then, because this was the first time he came to Damascus and stayed in a school called the Deir Yassin School... Do you know Faisal or Fawaz? Fawaz.

The questioner : Of the mills.

The Shaykh : Yes, of the mills... He had a close connection with the group, and he had a connection with me after he graduated from al-Azhar and benefited greatly, praise be to Allah. One day he came to me and said, "The Tawhid Party published a bulletin prohibiting the renting of land. What is your opinion of it?" I said to him, "I will study it." After I studied it, he said to me, "What is your opinion?" I said, "By Allah, it has many errors." He said to me, "What is your opinion about writing a response to it?" I said to him, "By Allah, I am not active in this, because I know that the Tawhid Party is a fanatical party; if there is a small detail, they say to him, 'Out.'