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﴿ فَاسْأَلُوا أَهْلَ الذِّكْرِ إِن كُنتُمْ لَا تَعْلَمُونَ ﴾

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The Ruling on Backbiting an Unknown Muslim

Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said regarding backbiting:
It is saying something about your brother which he would dislikeذِكْرك أخاك بما يكره
Sunan Abi Dawud 4874Sahih (Al-Albani)
, does it specify that it is the known brother or the unknown brother?

Answer:
A Muslim brother, meaning: you mention your Muslim brother as being stingy, miserly, or one who severs family ties, mentioning him with the things for which he is cursed.
Q: "There is no backbiting of an unknown person," is this correct?
A: Yes, an unknown person is not subject to backbiting. For example: "The family of so-and-so has such and such in them," or "Some people do such and such," this is not backbiting. It is necessary to identify the person.
Q: What if you say about one of the people you know, but there are six of them, and such and such is in them?
A: Backbiting must be directed at a specific person, whereas an unknown person is not subject to backbiting.
Q: And what is the thing that excluded the hadith; because the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said:
Your brotherأخاك
meaning: which brother?
A: Yes; because the harm of an unknown person is not known. If one says: "Such and such is in him," until hatred and enmity spread, they do not know who it is. This is like what the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said when they passed by a funeral and testified to its evil, saying:
It became obligatoryوجبت
, and the other group testified to its good, so he said:
It became obligatoryوجبت
. And he did not rebuke them; because the evil was apparent, and because they did not name them, saying: So-and-so, son of so-and-so.
Source binbaz.org.sa

The Arabic text is copied verbatim from the original source, without any edits.

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