Explanation of the Hadith of the Slave Girl.

The Shaykh : And among the hadiths that this man weakens, and some of his followers in the present day weaken, some of whom have certain letters and writings, is the Hadith of the Slave Girl. The Hadith of the Slave Girl. The Hadith whose authenticity was explicitly affirmed by about ten of the Imams of hadith, and it circulated in the books of the Sunnah, such as the Muwatta of Imam Malik, who is the earliest of the Imams known today in the narration of hadith. Imam Malik narrated it in the Muwatta, Imam Ahmad narrated it in the Musnad, Imam Muslim, Abu Awana, Ibn Hibban, and Ibn Khuzaymah all narrated it in their authentic collections, despite that.The Shaykh : Zuhayr al-Kawthari weakens it. Why? Because it carries the correct creed, as in this hadith. The hadith is also long, and I do not want to take up too much of your time with it. At the end of it, the narrator of the hadith, Mu'awiyah ibn al-Hakam al-Sulami, said: "O Messenger of Allah, I have a slave girl who tends my sheep in one of the two Fustats. One day a wolf attacked my sheep, and I am a human being who gets angry as humans do, so I struck her a blow." That is, the master struck the slave girl, the shepherd, on her cheek with his palm, and he regretted it. He said: "O Messenger of Allah, and I have upon me the freeing of a slave." As if he is consulting the Messenger, peace be upon him, whether it is valid for him to fulfill his vow, since he has upon him the freeing of a believing slave. He said: So he, peace be upon him, asked her. He said to her: The Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him and his family, testified for this slave girl regarding her faith when she answered the questions of her Messenger well. The first question: Where is Allah? She said: In the sky. The second question: Who am I? She said: You are the Messenger of Allah. He said: Now, whoever has not tried it, let him try it. Do it as an experiment. See, a Shaykh, old or young, a doctor from the doctors of the Shari'ah and other than the Shari'ah, ask them the question the Messenger of Allah asked the slave girl: Where is Allah? At that time, you will know that you are living in a Jahili society, a society that is Islamic in name but Jahili in creed and thought, to this day. You hear that Allah is present in all existence, that Allah is present everywhere. But the slave girl, a slave girl, and when it is said slave girl and shepherd of sheep, what does that mean? Educated? No, but she is educated, educated, but she is educated from a school other than our schools today. She is a girl who lived in a school that encompassed the entire Muslim society, even encompassing the shepherd with the sheep. So she knew the correct creed that the great Shaykhs of al-Azhar today do not know, let alone other universities. If you ask where Allah is, she answers: In the sky. Why? Because first, she reads every night; she does not sleep until after she reads the Surah of Tabarak, and in it is She reads it, but she understands it. Then she understands, but she understands with the Salafi understanding, because she lived in the first generation before the science of Kalam entered the creed of the Muslims, and they interpreted the texts for them in the manner of the Qadiyyah, who interpreted meaning the adornment of the Prophets. Likewise, the later Maturidi and Ash'ari scholars interpreted meaning the angels, meaning His punishment. Why this interpretation? Because they do not believe in the exaltation of Allah, Mighty and Majestic, above His Throne. And why should not this slave girl be upon this correct creed, and she hears such as the saying of the Prophet, may Allah pray upon him and his family: Say here, the angels?? It is Allah, Mighty and Majestic, the Most Merciful of the merciful. This slave girl answered with this correct answer because she graduated from the school of the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, and she is a slave girl tending sheep. So what do we say about the Companions and their great ones? This authentic hadith was denied by Zuhayr al-Kawthari, so we said to Abu Ghuddah, his student: Why do you deny this? The style is correct; al-Bukhari and Muslim narrated it. And do not deny your Shaykh for his denial of authentic hadiths, especially this hadith which upholds the creed of the scholars of the Salaf entirely. There is no difference between Malik, Abu Hanifah, al-Shafi'i, and Ahmad ibn Hanbal; they are all upon this correct creed that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, But this hadith, because it is explicit, Sīn and Jīm, the Messenger asks where Allah is, and she answers in the sky. They say it is not permissible to ask where Allah is? Why? Because they understand from the question that Allah has a place. And I hope our brothers present will be aware that when we, the people of the Salaf and the followers of the Salaf, and following the Salaf who believed that Allah is upon the Throne, He rose above it in a manner befitting His majesty and greatness, as it came from Imam Malik that a questioner asked him: O Malik: How did He rise? He said: "The rising is known, and the how is unknown, and asking about it is an innovation. Take the man out, for he is an innovator." So this is the reason. It is as if they believe that Allah is upon the Throne, but at the same time, they do not believe that Allah has a place. This combination of affirmation and negation is the correct creed: the belief that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, is above the Throne, a positive creed that is necessary, and the exalting of the Lord from place, a negative creed that requires exalting Allah from every place. That is because place is a creation from the creations of Allah, because in the authentic hadith So Allah, Mighty and Majestic, was and was not in a place, so He is free from place and time. But when He created the creation, He created the creation above Him, He created the creation and it sank into His belly, far be it from Him, so He is the Most High, the Supreme. This is the correct creed upon which the scholars of the Sunnah and the scholars of the righteous Salaf are, because the Hadith of the Slave Girl contains the explicit statement of where Allah is and the answer that He is in the sky. Therefore, they denied it, although it is an authentic hadith by the consensus of the scholars of the Muslims entirely, whether they are scholars of hadith, and this is their specialty, or scholars of tafsir or fiqh; they are all in agreement on the authenticity of this hadith. Despite that, some of them, even today, deny it. So we ask Allah for safety.

The questioner : May Allah reward you with good.