What is your opinion on the responses of students of knowledge to one another, which have reached the point of accusing each other of bad intentions?

The questioner: Regarding the responses currently in the arena toward students of knowledge and scholars, the observed thing in these responses is the accusation of intentions, O Shaykh.

The Shaykh: Indeed, by Allah.

The questioner: What is your response to this, or your interpretation of it?

The Shaykh: That they fear Allah. What is our response to this? That they fear Allah toward their Muslim brothers, that they purify their intentions and hearts, and that they do not harbor hatred for one another. As Allah commanded you. We say, O Professor, always and forever, the problem of the Islamic world now is their distance from two things, but one of them has taken the path, while the other has not. You must have heard in some of my tapes or words that reform begins with purification and education. You must have heard of this.

The questioner: Yes, Shaykh.

The Shaykh: So purification has something of this, but education is not present in the Islamic world. This is the problem. You find students of knowledge, who are supposed to be of the best good character, who have not encompassed anything but a portion of knowledge that was an argument against them, not for them. So what is the solution? There is no solution except Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He). And whoever among the people of knowledge is eager to walk on these two pillars, purification and education, he must raise those around him on this foundation from the softness of their nails, so that when they grow up and mature, they mature with correct knowledge and correct education. As for these elders who have come to the obligation of purification and have taken a large or near-large share of it, they are very rare among those who have purified themselves from bad morals, envy, and hatred, and may Allah protect us. Today the matter is very apparent, even from some of the special ones, even from some of the special ones. I even find myself compelled sometimes to say, by the apparent meaning of the saying of Allah the Exalted, and when I say "apparent," I mean what I say: I said "apparent" because in the apparent meaning of the verse, there is no command to enjoin good and forbid evil. But do you know the hadith of Abu Bakr al-Siddiq when he rebuked some people and mentioned to them that they interpret it other than its interpretation? And he mentioned the hadith that commands Muslims to enjoin good and forbid evil. In the name of Allah. The apparent phenomena spreading now in the recent period in Saudi Arabia, before that in many Islamic countries, this reality has no cure except by taking the possible causes and turning to Allah (Mighty and Majestic) to rectify the conditions of the Muslims. Otherwise, there is absolutely no justification for the callers to the Book and the Sunnah, and those who belong to the methodologies of the Salaf al-Salih, to divide into two factions, or rather into factions, where some oppose each other as if there are Salafis and their enemies are Sufis, and they are one group, all of whom say, "I am upon the Book and the Sunnah," even if some of them do not accept being attributed to the Salaf al-Salih. And this is one of the problems that occurred among you.