Benefits of the Hadith: The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) invited us, so we pledged allegiance to him...

The Shaykh : This hadith contains a summary, namely his saying: "and he was ill". The benefit of this is that it shows the narrator’s control over the hadith, indicating that he mentioned the state of the one who reported it. It also has another benefit: a sick person will not report anything unless he knows with absolute certainty that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said it. For a sick person, the world is certainly of little value to him, and the Hereafter is more precious to him than the world. You will find that he does not speak except about what he knows to be the truth. He says: "He narrated to us a hadith by which Allah may benefit you, which I heard from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him)", meaning there is no intermediary between you and him. He said: The pledge of allegiance is: a covenant. It is called a pledge of allegiance because each of the two parties extends his hand to the other to hold his hand, saying thus, and he clasps his hand and says, "I pledge allegiance to you on such and such." So it was not on hearing and obedience. Allah the Exalted said: And He said regarding the People of the Book: Here he says: Hearing: so that we understand what is said and what is commanded. Obedience: so that we execute it. : Meaning, in our eagerness to accept and our reluctance to accept. This means that we hear and obey in a matter we receive with enthusiasm and in a matter we receive with aversion. This is one aspect. The other aspect is: : In the eagerness of the body, because if a person executes a command while his body is energetic, it is easy for him. : With hardship in the body, because if a person executes a command while tired and in distress, he feels some aversion. : Our hardship is the scarcity of wealth, and our ease is its abundance. The evidence for this is the saying of Allah the Exalted: : This is the important point, meaning that we hear and obey despite the preference shown to us, meaning the preference imposed on us. Let us suppose, for example, that we are ordered to do something, and the rulers prefer themselves over us by not doing what they order us to do, or by not leaving what they forbid us from doing. Or they prefer themselves over us in wealth and do with it whatever they wish, and we are unable to do as they do. This is part of the preference, and there are many things regarding preference and self-preference. So it is obligatory upon us to hear and obey even in this situation. : Meaning, we do not try to establish a power to contest them, nor do we take a share of their power, because the power belongs to them, so we do not contest them. He said: : So in this situation, we contest them. But look at the conditions: that you see with your own eyes, not merely by hearing. Because we may hear things about the rulers, and when we verify them, we do not find them true. So we must see with our own eyes directly, whether it is seeing through knowledge or seeing with the eye. The important thing is that we know. The second condition: Meaning, not open sinfulness. If we see in them the greatest open sinfulness, it is not permissible for us to contest them in authority, but rather we must see disbelief. The third condition: : Meaning, explicit disbelief that does not admit of interpretation. If it admits of interpretation, and we see it as disbelief, but they do not see it as disbelief—whether they do not see it as such due to their own independent reasoning or due to following a scholar they consider a qualified reasoner—then we do not contest them, even if it is disbelief. For this reason, Imam Ahmad used to say: "Whoever says the Qur'an is created is a disbeliever". And al-Ma'mun used to say the Qur'an is created and called people to it. Nevertheless, he was called the Commander of the Faithful because he saw that the statement that the Qur'an is created, in his case, was not explicit and not clear. So this disbelief must be explicit and not admit of interpretation. If it admits of interpretation, it is not permissible for us to contest the people of authority. The fourth condition: : Meaning, conclusive evidence that it is disbelief, not merely that we see it as disbelief, nor merely that the evidence is possible to be disbelief or not. Rather, we must know that the evidence is explicit and conclusive that it is disbelief. So look at these four conditions. If the four conditions are met, then we contest him. But this contestation has conditions. What are they? That we have the ability. And this is very important. It means not contesting and going out to him with knives and donkey drivers, while he has tanks and missiles and the like. If we did that, we would be fools. We would be contesting him after being unable to contest him. Do you understand or not? But we contest while we are unable. This is first of all forbidden upon us, because it harms us and harms others as well. And because it leads in the end to the erasure of what we want the authority to be. For the authority, as you know, has power and wants its word to be what? The highest. So if it sees contestation, arrogance takes hold of it, and it persists in what it is doing and increases it. So our contestation of it would add to the trouble. Therefore, it is not permissible for us to contest it unless we have the ability and strength to remove it, otherwise not. And based on this, we know the error of those who act in a way that does not meet these conditions. Because we see the reality now. Are those who rise in the name of Islam against a state that is established, with forces it possesses and many supporters of falsehood, and then we rise, and we do not have even a quarter of what they have? What is the result? A bad, opposite result occurs. And we do not deny that this may be the seed of a distant future, but we do not know. And a person looks at what is before him. As for the future, if some people say, "I am planning now for this revolution and I am proceeding with it, and even if I do not succeed in it, but they say it is a plan for what? For the future, perhaps someone among the people will do it." We say this is a possibility. And if it happens that he does it as you did, the result is the same. So we must be patient until we have the ability to contest and remove. The matter is very serious, and a person takes a lesson from the previous reality and the recent present reality and is admonished. The examples are perhaps in your minds now, even if we do not cite them, but they are clear. So if we proceed according to what the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) pledged his Companions to, and we add to these four conditions a condition mentioned by Allah in the Qur'an and mentioned by the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) in the hadith, what is it? The ability. This is necessary in every obligation. Allah does not burden a soul beyond its capacity. And it is possible that if a person sees in a ruler that the conditions are met, he may be able to contest, but not face-to-face confrontation, but through paths that people call diplomacy. He can reach the depth in areas that are not good to mention and achieve his goal. As for confrontation as some people do, this is not of the religion in any way, even if he has good intention and good deeds, worship, and knowledge. But he does not have wisdom. And Allah said regarding wisdom: Then there is another path other than contestation. We do not know, perhaps Allah will bring good through it, and that is advising through wise, strong means. For example, those who have a word with the ruler and closeness to him, meaning proximity to him, and they have their word, they gather and study the situation completely, with a careful, firm, and deep study. Because a quick study does not achieve anything. A superficial study does not achieve anything. It must be a careful, deep study. And the study is not just a study of faults, because if the ruler’s faults are mentioned and his virtues are not mentioned, he says, "This is an ungrateful person." Mention the virtues and mention the faults. And if you mention the faults, it is not enough to put them before the ruler like this, open, open, closed, open for him to look at, closed. In exiting from them, mention them open for him to look at, then mention them open for him to exit from them. Say, "This is forbidden, this is not permissible religiously. If this is executed, then Allah the Exalted may spoil the matter for you. But you have the other way: do this, and it is better." Then mention the benefits of this thing. Allah taught us that, and taught us the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) that. So in the Qur'an, Allah the Exalted said: When He forbade them the prohibited, He showed them the permissible. Do not say, "We have considered it," but say, "We have looked at it." And the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said regarding the man who came to him with good dates and said, "I take one sa' of this for two sa's, and two sa's for three sa's." He said: He did not say, "This is usury," and remain silent. He showed him the faults, but he did not take him out of them; rather, he showed him what takes him out of them. This may make Allah bring good through it, with good intention and wisdom in conveying advice to the ruler. But, what Allah willed, the youth love the thing immediately, they rush out, and they get from the harm what you hear on the radio. And I ask Allah for their guidance. And the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) drew for us a good, straight path. (peace and blessings be upon him and his family).