The discussion regarding al-Saqaf and his defective creed

The questioner : Abu Muti’ al-Balkhi, or al-Balkhi?

The Shaykh : Al-Balkhi.

The questioner : The one who transmitted from Abu Hanifah in *Al-Fiqh al-Akbar* that whoever says, "I do not know where my Lord is," has committed disbelief. Did the Shaykh mention in this narration in the book *Sharh al-'Aqidah al-Tahawiyyah*? I have not translated this narration for Abu Muti’ al-Balkhi; I have not translated it for him.

The Shaykh : I have translated it from the hadith perspective; it is rejected.

The questioner : If it is rejected from the hadith perspective, how do we accept this narration from Abu Hanifah?

The Shaykh : And who told you that you need to accept his narration?

The questioner : According to what I hear.

The Shaykh : You did not answer me.

The questioner : I want to see if his narration is rejected.

The Shaykh : You did not answer me.

The questioner : What is the question?

The Shaykh : Do you mean I should repeat the question?

The questioner : Yes, indeed.

The Shaykh : Is that permissible?

The questioner : I do not want to criticize... I am not asking this question for myself; I am asking it on behalf of others.

The Shaykh : I know that, which is why I advised you and told you to stay away from evil. And what do you want with this al-Saqaf?
Al-Halabi : His tricks are exposed.

The Shaykh : Yes?
Al-Halabi : His tricks are exposed.

The Shaykh : Yes.

The questioner : He says he wants to prove to you who al-Albani is, but praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds, there is nothing in which he has convinced me.

The Shaykh : Praise be to Allah, this is my brother. Do you hear the saying of Allah the Exalted: If we were to rule that this al-Balkhi is to be executed, both in terms of his person and his narration, would we lose anything?

The questioner : No.

The Shaykh : If so, why are you engaging with this whispering? He wants to mislead people by obsessing over and clinging to superficial matters. If the man disbelieves by saying what Allah the Exalted said: The mass-transmitted texts in this meaning—this meaning upon which Muslims should be united in faith, because, unfortunately, some philosophy has entered among the Muslims. From this philosophy comes the idea that creed is not established except by a text that is definitive in its authenticity and definitive in its meaning. The issue of the Exaltation of Allah, Mighty and Majestic, above His Throne meets these two conditions. There are mass-transmitted texts affirming the Exaltation of Allah, Mighty and Majestic, above His creation, and these texts are certain.

The questioner : Peace be upon you.

The Shaykh : And peace be upon you and the mercy of Allah. If you see a person who claims to be a Muslim and claims to be a scholar, yet he positions himself to combat the callers to acting in accordance with the Book and the Sunnah, and you see him turning away from these texts that are definitive in authenticity and meaning, and he comes to occupy you with al-Balkhi, it means you must be wary of this person. It means you do not know how to handle this person. Did you discuss with him how to refute these definitive meanings so that he would occupy us with the question of whether al-Balkhi’s narration is authentic or not? I suspect you did not do so. I hope I am wrong in my suspicion, and I hope you will correct my suspicion.

Another questioner : Besides, there is something more important than this.

The Shaykh : No problem. I believe that if you had done so, it would have spared you from hearing his denial of these definitive proofs. You would not have been occupied with him asking, "What is the value of this al-Balkhi in narration? What is his value in understanding?" and so on. But I suspect you did not engage with him. I may offer you an excuse: you are still inexperienced, meaning you have not matured in knowledge, so we excuse you. But we do not excuse you at all for entering into these struggles and surrendering the leadership of your self, your mind, and your thought to him, listening to him. This is not permissible. Perhaps I have answered you with the summary of this matter. When you called me by phone and I was surprised by you when you once requested me by phone, the people of the house apologized to you, and you said you had an oral message from this al-Saqaf. What Allah wills! I would have liked to be the one who conveyed this to you, so I could tell you: Tell your al-Saqaf that this oral message should be sent in writing. Why are you conveying the oral message and delivering it?

The questioner : The Shaykh : Hasan al-Saqaf has published new books, all of which attack you and stab at you and stab at the creed of the Salaf. He has dedicated his life and devoted his life to attacking the Salaf. Therefore, he now has very large manuscripts. He has now published a new book titled *The Dictionary of Al-Albani’s Insults* and distributed it toThe Shaykh : Muhammad Shuqara.

The Shaykh : What Allah willed.

The questioner : It is permissible. He sent you a copy of this book. I spoke with him on the phone yesterday, or the day before yesterday. He told me he wanted to assign you a mission. I asked him what the mission was. He told me he wanted you to visitThe Shaykh : Nasir al-Din al-Albani and deliver this book, *The Dictionary of Al-Albani’s Insults*. So I gave it toThe Shaykh : Abu Malik. He told me, is it permissibleThe Shaykh : for Abu Malik to deliver it to Shaykh Nasir al-Albani? Is it permissible? He said about him laterThe Shaykh : that al-Albani is in no need of it. At the beginning, when I first enteredThe Shaykh : Hasan al-Saqaf’s presence, that was the beginning of my acquaintance with him.
Abu Layla : Do not say "Shaykh."

The Shaykh : The beginning of my acquaintance with Hasan al-Saqaf: I visited him at his house and spoke with him on the phone. He said he wanted me at his house. He came to my house by car and took me to his office.

The Shaykh : I mean, when he told you he wanted you at his house, did you say to him, "You"?

The questioner : I want to know about Hasan al-Saqaf, who published these books. What is his value? What is his knowledge?

The Shaykh : I told him, either by implication or by explicit statement, "I am at your service," it is clear like that.

The questioner : The intention of our Shaykh from the visit was acquaintance. So I visited him at his house, entered his library, and visited him. He gave me all the works he had authored and showed me all the manuscripts... He told me he wanted me to become his student. At first, I was easygoing with him and smooth with him. I visited him on a Thursday, and he told me, "I have a lesson today after the 'Isha' prayer in one of the houses of a person in al-Zarqa. I will pass by your house by car, and you will go attend the lesson and see how my lesson is." I told him, "Pass by me before the 'Isha' prayer, before the time of the lesson, and I will, if Allah wills, go with you." Of course, he now thinks I am going to become his student. He passed by, and I went with him. He gave a lesson on creed from a book by Ibn al-Jawzi.

The Shaykh : *Daf' Shubhat al-Tashbih*.

The questioner : Yes, he has many students, most of them students of the University of Jordan and the colleges, and so on. He is still teaching. He reads from the book; he reads, and they transcribe. I mean, he explains. Of course, Allah knows best about the explanation he gives. After he gave the complete lesson on creed, of course,The student : he began reciting Sufi hymns, and they began responding to him. So they recited, and the others responded to him. At the end of the lesson, one of the young men stood up and asked him, "There are people here in Jordan who do not know how to pray or how to fast. There are people who do not even know the ruling on prayer, do not know the forms of prayer, do not know the forms of bowing, do not know the forms of prostration. You claim to be a scholar and place yourself in the rank of scholars, but we have not seen you produce a single book that encourages prayer and its forms, and how we pray, and how we fast, and how, and how. All your books are insults and attacks, O Shaykh. Why did you dedicate your life to attacking and disparagingThe Shaykh : al-Albani? He said to him, "I agree with you. I do not likeThe Shaykh : that young man, al-Albani. But I tell you, why did you dedicate your life to attacking and disparagingThe Shaykh : al-Albani? Why do you not teach us, who are sitting in front of you, how to pray and how to fast? You give us lessons on creed, my brother. I do not know how to fast or how to pray, and all those in front of you do not know the forms of prayer and its movements. Ask them about hadiths, and they will tell you they do not memorize them. So how are you sitting teaching us creed and wanting to appear as a reference in creed, and so on? He did not answer the young man. After we left the lesson, he said to me, "I hope you liked it." I told him, "At first, there is no harm in your lesson for the sake of luring people." Then he said to me, "I want to show you a simple letter from Shaykh al-Albani in which he declares the four Imams disbelievers."

The Shaykh : May Allah take revenge on the liars.

The questioner : I said to him, "May Allah reward you with good. Bring it." We looked at this letter thatThe Shaykh : al-Albani declares the four Imams disbelievers. I mean, he wanted to distance me from the Salafi path. I told him, "May Allah reward you with good," and we looked for it. I went home. The next day, Friday, I reviewed the letter. The book says, "ThisThe Shaykh : Nasir al-Albani... The book, I mean, it is not written in any printing press, and it is not written that the copyright is reserved for publication, or anything. It is an ordinary white book, and it is written in it: Authored by Muhammad Nasir al-Din al-Albani. And I took the brother Abu Tariq to task for it."

The Shaykh : I mean, it is not his authorship?

The questioner : No, it is not his authorship.

The Shaykh : My authorship, he claimed.

The questioner : Your authorship is written as authored byThe Shaykh : Muhammad Nasir al-Din al-Albani.
Al-Halabi : Is the name of the author written on the book?

The questioner : There is no title written on it. It is a book without a title. He told me, "I want this book, and I ask you to bring it to me."The Shaykh : Al-Albani says in the book that the four Imams are Ash'aris in creed and have exited the Islamic religion. From this nonsense and this speech, I said to him, "Is this definitely by Shaykh Nasir al-Din al-Albani?" He said to me, "It is definitely by Shaykh Nasir al-Din al-Albani." This book, of course, how does he want to win people over, O Shaykh? How does he want to win over the students so that he makes them hateThe Shaykh : Al-Albani and his ideas?The Shaykh : Al-Albani brings them this book. The ignorant common person, when he reads the book, believes it by nature. He says to you, "This is not possible." He prints it or brings it, knowing that he has a printing press in his house.The Shaykh : Hasan al-Saqaf.
Abu Layla : It did not occur to any of the intelligent young men to ask nowThe Shaykh : over the phone whether this book is yours or not...

The questioner : It is not for everyone to bring it.
Abu Layla : I mean, for example, you.

The questioner : In the end, I and my brother 'Umar visited him at his house. He told me, "By the way, I have written a new treatise." He gives us the manuscripts before he prints the book; he gives it to me, meaning the manuscripts.

The Shaykh : So does that mean you are his secretary?

The questioner : So he gave me the manuscript of the book "Purifying the Flowing Pus from the Mouth of Marwan al-Qaysi the Reckless."
Al-Halabi : In the end, O our Shaykh, what is the name of the author? He said, "Nasif Talfi Hamsh." It is not a pen name; I mean, his name is Nasif Talfi Hamsh.

Another questioner : Then he wrote in it about Al-Albani...

The questioner : So he describesThe Shaykh : Nasir al-Albani as lacking academic integrity. But if you read this book, O Shaykh, if you examine and study the book "Concepts of Islam" by Dr. Marwan al-Qaysi, you will find thatThe Shaykh : Hasan al-Saqaf does not have academic precision in quoting from the book...
Al-Halabi : You have elevated his status when you say he does not have precision...

The Shaykh: Allahu Akbar.
Al-Halabi : Look, O our Shaykh, there is a point. No harm, after appreciating my brother, may Allah bless you. Our brother 'Isa, whom our brotherAbu Layla : mentioned to you, visited me yesterday, O our Shaykh. The conversation turned to the treatise I wrote recently. I said, "The truth is, I did not like to follow up on everything in it, but fragments and the like." He said to me, "I followed up on something. Do you remember, O our Shaykh, in the introduction this wicked one says, 'And Al-Albani imitates some scholars in attribution, and they are mistaken in their attribution, like al-Suyuti. He attributed hadith number so-and-so, number so-and-so, and number so-and-so, about eight hadiths, to Sunan Ibn Majah, and not one of them is found in Ibn Majah.'"

The Shaykh : I mean, in the collection?
Al-Halabi : In the collection. 'Isa gave me a paper now where he traced them hadith by hadith; they are all in Ibn Majah, hadith by hadith. What do you think, O our Shaykh? By Allah, this means that one is hesitant in declaring him a disbeliever, but it is like this in our religion. Otherwise, by Allah, I would draw closer to Allah the Exalted by declaring this man a disbeliever, because when he says about Mu'awiya that he is a hypocrite and says about Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah that he is a disbeliever, have you not heard that he says about Mu'awiya that he is a hypocrite? Have you heard?

The questioner : He visited me at my house, and a group of young men were present. So I said to him, "Is it true that you declare Ibn Taymiyyah a disbeliever?" He says, "Yes, I declare Ibn Taymiyyah a disbeliever, and I declare Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyyah a disbeliever, and I declareThe Shaykh : Al-Albani a disbeliever, and I declare a disbeliever everyone who belongs to Salafism. Whoever has a Salafi creed, I declare him a disbeliever!" And I will ask about this before Allah: that he declared a disbeliever whoever belongs to the Salafi creed and believes in the Salafi creed, and he declared Ibn Taymiyyah a disbeliever. So he was talking with me on the phone the day before yesterday: "Are you satisfied with me? How are you satisfied with me and my lessons, and so on?" I said to him, "Are you satisfied or not? What do you want to say?" He says to me, "I want to entrust you with this responsibility to deliver it to Shaykh Al-Albani, which I mentioned previously, which is the book 'Dictionary of Al-Albani's Insults.'" I said to him, "By Allah, I am sorry to deliver this book toThe Shaykh : Nasir al-Albani, becauseThe Shaykh : Al-Albani is above reading such a book. I, O Shaykh, when I got to know you, I was hearing from the common people, not from the scholars, that there is someone on earth called Hasan al-Saqaf who works in knowledge. I heard it from the common people, not from the scholars, because the scholars do not know you; they are above knowing you. So I called him on the phone with a clean call and said to him, "When I came to you, I thought you had knowledge. These books that you publish... So your hobby is swimming and horseback riding. By the way, his hobby was swimming and horseback riding. He used to make a clean call, a call that was heardThe Shaykh : very clearly...

The Shaykh : Hehehe.

The questioner : I advised him and said to him, "Work in knowledge. You need knowledge. You now have nothing of knowledge at all."

The Shaykh : Now... the owner of two things: one is what I did not mention, and the other, which is more important, is sincerity to Allah the Exalted. Because suppose he became the most knowledgeable of people, he would be Iblis. But what took Iblis out of the mercy of Allah and made him deserving of expulsion? It was his arrogance. So this man is arrogant. And as you know, from his saying (peace be upon him) So what do you want? More arrogance than this boldness: declaring the great scholars of the past, such as Ibn Taymiyyah and Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyyah, disbelievers, and then people like us, the students of knowledge who are bent on serving the Sunnah. At least, I mean, you must have read in some writings the saying of whoever said, "The people of hadith are the people of the Prophet, even if *** they did not accompany his breath, they accompanied him." So if we did not have anything that brings us closer to Allah except that we always, I mean, if you do not understand this word, we feel with the Prophetic hadith and we say, "The Messenger of Allah said, and may Allah pray upon Muhammad," and so on, that would be enough for us in honor and pride. What more, when you see that I have reached old age and I am in the service of the hadith of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him). Whether I hit the mark or missed, that is another matter. Every son of Adam errs, so whether I hit the mark or missed, but I have dedicated myself to Allah and to serving the hadith of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him). Then a person comes with all boldness, all impudence, all lack of modesty and manners, and says, "This man is a disbeliever." Well, what is the evidence of his disbelief? Because I say Allahu Akbar! So this is truly one of two things, as our brother Abu al-Harith said: either he is a disbeliever in the depths of his heart and displays Islam to mislead people from the path of Allah the Exalted by attacking those who came before and those who came after among those who belong to the correct creed. This is the least that can be said. And therefore, our position regarding this man is one of two things: we call upon Allah the Exalted, either that He reform him or that He take revenge on him soon. Either He reforms him or He takes revenge on him soon. For we have not seen a calamity with many of the misguided and misguiding people. We have not seen a person with this impudence and this boldness in declaring disbelievers and in misleading, with intense enthusiasm and very strange activity. We have never seen such a person. So we fear what we fear: that there are people behind him who move him. Do you hear about puppets? Do you know puppets? We fear that there are people behind him from the disbelievers, those who always try to sow discord among Muslims by all means. And Allah is the Helper.
Al-Halabi : O our Shaykh, Subhan Allah. When I knew the truth of this wicked one and remembered al-Kawthari and his distortions and his concealments, I said, may Allah be pleased with al-Kawthari, compared to this liar, this wicked liar.

The Shaykh : Correct.
Al-Halabi : Al-Kawthari did not write a word without knowing that the truth is contrary to what he writes. He distorts the truth and makes falsehood contrary to the truth. But al-Kawthari, as we take from him, had something of fairness and virtue, despite the fact that we believe he was a distorter and a deceiver. Both are from one school. But by Allah, the difference between al-Kawthari and the distortions of this liar is nothing, truly.

The Shaykh : Another difference: al-Kawthari was a scholar. If he had been combined with sincerity, he would have excelled the scholars of his time, because he had knowledge of manuscripts and books of hadith and biographies, and so on, considering that he was the Shaykh al-Islam in Istanbul, and the libraries in Istanbul are among the richest libraries in the world in Islamic heritage in all the sciences of the Shari'ah. And therefore, the man was truly a scholar. And I bear witness to this man for knowledge and virtue. But his knowledge did not benefit him; rather, it harmed him, because Hanafi and Maturidi sectarianism overcame him. So the difference between that man, a scholar, and this man, a vagrant, an ignorant man, a man who has no knowledge at all. You say in language, he has nothing in tafsir, he has nothing in hadith, he has nothing in fiqh, nothing at all.

The questioner : We referred to this book titled "Al-Albani's Clear Contradictions." We checked *Silsilat al-Ahadith al-Sahihah*, *al-Da'if*, and *al-Jami' al-Saghir*, and we did not find any contradiction. We wrote down the numbers of the hadiths on a piece of paper and told him, "This is not correct; what you are mentioning about Al-Albani's books is not true." He took the numbers of the hadiths and said, "I want to review them on my end."

Another questioner : I debated him about them because he is the one who wrote thatThe Shaykh : Al-Albani, in *Silsilat al-Ahadith al-Sahihah*, mentioned that hadith number so-and-so, authenticating it in *al-Sahih* and weakening it in such-and-such a book. We looked into the book ofThe Shaykh : Nasser and foundThe Shaykh : that Nasser apologized for weakening the hadith in the book; he authenticated it in *al-Sahih* but apologized for weakening it in such-and-such a book. We wrote down the numbers of the hadiths for him and debated him about them, so he meant... regarding them, he said, "Okay, I will review them at home."

Another questioner : The first time we sat with him, my Shaykh, I debated him about the issue of . He said to me, "You are one of Al-Albani's followers." The first thing he said when we sat down was . He said, "It is Jibril, and Jibril receives the command from the Lord of Majesty to, for example, cause a subsidence..." He said, "This is how I respond to it." He asked, "What is your evidence that Allah is in the sky?" I said to him, "Also, the hadith of the maidservant: you held on to the hadith of the maidservant, and the hadith of the maidservant has three narrations. You left two and held on to the narration where she said, 'In the sky.'" He said . He said, "Here, we cannot say which one is the most correct because there are three narrations, but you and the infallible Al-Albani held on to one narration." I said to him, "Also..."

The Shaykh : Excuse me, which narration is the most correct according to the poor man?

The questioner : He did not authenticate any one of them; he said, "I cannot authenticate any one of them."

The Shaykh : So what is the benefit of his statement?

The questioner : It means he crossed out the hadith entirely. I said to him, "Allah, Glorified and Exalted, addressed our master 'Isa in the Qur'an with the meaning of the verse: 'I will purify you and raise you to Myself.' He said, 'He needs to purify him and raise him above the people.'"

The Shaykh : Does he say "above the people" or "to Me"?

The questioner : He raises him above the people; that is also a raising above the rest of creation. Also, . He said, "It is the angels in the sky and the angels who show mercy to the people." This was his interpretation; it was his muddling.
Al-Halabi : And his "ha" (particle) suffices for his response.

The Shaykh : Yes, indeed.

The questioner : Other than the hadith . I said to him, "There is a hadith from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) saying ." He said, "You have muddled the hadith. In reality, the letter 'ya' is with a damma (vowel), meaning 'an angel descends' or 'a caller descends' in the last third of the night: 'Is there anyone seeking forgiveness? I will forgive him.'"

The Shaykh : The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) spoke the truth .

The questioner : I said to him, "Because he says, 'We say Allahu Akbar (Allah is the Greatest). If we say Allahu Akbar and say Allah is in the sky, we negate the word Allahu Akbar. It is not befitting His Majesty to be inside His creation.'" I said to him, "You have fallen into a contradiction." He said to me, "Show me the contradiction you have fallen into." I said, "The sky: the sun is greater than the earth, and we see the sun as a piece moving in a sea, which is the lowest sky. If we reached the sun and looked at the earth, we would see the earth as a chickpea. It is not befitting Allah that He be inside this chickpea. The lowest sky in relation to the second sky is like a ring, as the scholars said, and the third in relation to the fourth, and what about the seventh? And the Throne is greater than all these creations. Because he says, 'This is all nonsense; I do not respond to it.' I said to him, 'There is a hadith; if you are from the people of knowledge, you must act upon it. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said .' Because he told him, 'Go, memorize *Sahih Muslim* and *Sahih al-Bukhari* and the Noble Book, then come back and debate me.' And he withdrew from the debate.

The Shaykh : He has memorized all these books. Okay, excuse me, I want to know: what does he say if asked, "Where is Allah?" What is his answer?

The questioner : He says, "Allah is not limited by place or time."

Another questioner : He says, "He is not inside the world, nor outside the world, nor connected to the world, nor to the right of the world, nor to the left of the world." And he has a treatise on this titled "The Creed of the People of the Sunnah and the Community."