What is the validity of some preachers’ division of the Sunnah into familiar and unfamiliar Sunnah, and what is the criterion for benefit and harm when applying the Sunnah and calling people to it?

The questioner : Praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds, and may peace and blessings be upon our Prophet, the trustworthy one, and upon his family and all his Companions. As for what follows, he says:The questioner : Some preachers have divided the Sunnah into two categories: a Sunnah familiar to people and a Sunnah not familiar to people. Consequently, they call the young people who urge people to follow the Sunnah to follow it, advising them to consider the benefit of the da'wah (calling) and the harm, and not to repel people. What is your opinion of this division? And what is the criterion for benefit and harm when applying the Sunnah and calling people to it?

The Shaykh : I say, after praising Allah and sending peace and blessings upon the Messenger of Allah, his family, his Companions, and those who follow them in excellence until the Day of Judgment: In my opinion, if this division comes from any of the Islamic preachers, the least that can be said about it is that it is an innovated division. And when I say that it is an innovated division, I must point out that bid'ah (religious innovation) is of two types according to the scholars. One type is agreed upon to be a misguiding bid'ah; it is the bid'ah that contradicts the Sunnah, whether that Sunnah is verbal or practical. So any event or bid'ah that contradicts the Prophetic Sunnah is, by the consensus of the scholars, a misguiding bid'ah. The other type is one in which the scholars differed, if the bid'ah does not contradict an explicit Sunnah, as we mentioned in the first category. Here, the scholars have two well-known positions. The first, which is the correct one without doubt according to the people of knowledge and investigation, is what is found in the explicit and authentic saying of him (peace and blessings be upon him): The other position, which is the weaker one, as is known from our previous statement, is the one that divides bid'ah into five categories. I say, in clear Arabic, that this division is also a bid'ah, just like the division I said was an innovated division. However, this division is more recent in innovation than the old division. The division of bid'ah into five categories is held by many well-known scholars, and they have their own ijtihad (independent legal reasoning) despite their error. As for dividing the Sunnah into Sunnah...?

The questioner : Familiar.

The Shaykh : And not familiar. This division is from the innovations of this time. So I say that if it is so, there is no doubt that the scholars agreed that every newly invented matter and every bid'ah that contradicts what the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) was upon is a misguiding bid'ah. Even those who divide bid'ah into five categories, this is their saying. Those who say that some newly invented matters and some occurring things are recommended (mustahabb) stipulate that this bid'ah must fall under some general texts, on the condition that it does not contradict a Prophetic text, whether from his saying (peace and blessings be upon him) or his action. This Sunnah that they called "not familiar" contradicts many, many Sunnahs. First of all, there is an authentic hadith, or there is an authentic hadith that we will mention. And by mentioning it, as they say, we kill two birds with one stone. First, we strike the old bid'ah, which is the division of bid'ah into five categories, because those who say that bid'ah is divided into five categories argue with the following hadith. And it is also our refutation of this bid'ah, or of those who say this new bid'ah, which is the "unfamiliar Sunnah." I mean by that hadith what Imam Muslim narrated in his Sahih from the hadith of Jarir ibn Abdullah al-Bajali (may Allah be pleased with him), who said: We were sitting with the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) around him when some Bedouins came, wearing patched cloaks, wearing swords, most of them from Mudar, or rather all of them from Mudar. When the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) saw them, his face became dark, meaning his features changed (peace and blessings be upon him) out of sadness at the extreme poverty he saw in them. So the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) preached to his Companions, admonishing and reminding them. And among what he said to them was: Allah the Exalted said: Then he (peace and blessings be upon him) said a hadith from his own words: So none of those sitting who were affected by his admonition (peace and blessings be upon him) but that he rushed to his house to return carrying in the corner of his garment whatever charity he could manage, whether food, dirhams, or dinars, and he placed it before the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). When the rest of the Companions saw what their brother had done, each of them also stood up to return carrying whatever charity he could manage. The narrator Jarir (may Allah be pleased with him) says: This was in contrast to the initial state where his face had become dark (peace and blessings be upon him) out of sadness at their poverty. But when he (peace and blessings be upon him) saw that his Companions had responded to Allah and the Messenger when He called them to that which gives life, it was a cause for the features of the Prophet’s face (peace and blessings be upon him) to change with joy, delight, and happiness at their response to his admonition and their giving charity to these poor Arabs. So he (peace and blessings be upon him) said on this occasion, and here is the point: The hadith ends, and it is, as we said, in Sahih Muslim.

The Shaykh : The point of this hadith is that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) urges in this hadith to revive a Sunnah that people have let die for one reason or another from these reasons: negligence is one of these reasons, ignorance is one of these reasons, people’s greed for the worldly life is one of these reasons. So a Muslim stands up and revives a Sunnah, and revives a worship from the acts of worship that have become neglected and abandoned, and he revives it and people follow his example in it. He is written the reward of it and the reward of whoever acts upon it until the Day of Resurrection, without anything being deducted from their rewards. This hadith is explicit in its indication in this area...