The ruling on building tents for holding mourning gatherings

Question:
After the death of the deceased—in our areas in the south—after the death of the deceased… they build tents next to the house of the deceased, and they hold parties and slaughter animals in them?

Answer:
This is a religious innovation (bid'ah), this is a mourning gathering. We have clarified this many times in the newspapers, and letters were read to them in the south, and it was clarified in the newspapers and magazines. All of this has been clarified, and it is an evil (munkar); it is not permissible.

Question : Is this a religious innovation (bid'ah)?

Answer: Yes, it is a religious innovation (bid'ah); it is not permissible, yes.

Question : Is it permissible for us to go to them to offer condolences, and they are in this state?

Answer: No.

Question : But their gathering without tents, and without a vehicle, but the gathering of everyone, meaning…?

Answer: If they visit them to offer condolences, that is a recommended practice (sunnah). But holding a party for this, and a mourning gathering, is not permissible.

Question : No, they gather, they come… they return the condolences, and the family of the deceased receives them?

Answer: They receive them in their houses; there is no need to set up camps. They receive them in their houses, and praise be to Allah…

Question : But what is the ruling on their holding of this? What is the ruling…

Answer: This is an evil (munkar) with no basis; this is a mourning gathering among the types of mourning gatherings.

Question : Sometimes the houses are too small to accommodate the condolence visitors, because they come in the thousands. So they make a place to protect them from the heat, or the cold, or the rain, and they receive the condolence visitors there, and then they leave?

Answer: If there is… without feasts, without anything… when there is a need for it.