Question :
What line separates atheism from Islam? Is the person who confesses to believe in One God and in Muhammad as the Prophet of that God, and who despite his praying and fasting then commits acts which are contrary to the nature of Islam, to be considered guilty of disbelief [literally: polytheism, shirk]? What is the ruling on someone who persists in committing sinful acts?
Fatwa in Brief: There are ten ways in which
Muslims may lose their Islam. These include: polytheism;
believing in [and praying to] intermediaries [other than
God] to intercede for one; refusing to declare
polytheists to be non-Muslim; preferring guidance
offered by [someone or something] other than the Prophet
(upon him be peace); hating any of the teachings of the
Prophet (upon him be peace); mocking any part of the
religion; practicing magic; cooperating with polytheists
against Muslims; believing that specific people do not
need to follow the Prophet (upon him be peace); and
turning away from the religion of God, neither learning
nor applying it (Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab, al-Durrar
al-Sunniyah, 5th edition, pp 10-91).
Willful persistence in sinning, in full awareness that
one commits a sin, will lead to moral destruction and
lends support to the practice of sins. Such persistence
is also a clear indication of polytheism. It is as if
the sinner were saying: I am aware that charging
interest on money lent (riba) and adultery are
sins; yet, I will nevertheless continue to do them. This
is a violation, a clear transgression [over the
boundaries of the religion]; there is no doubt that this
person is an unbeliever.
Abu Ishaq al-Huwaini. Audio Tape. “Al-Ithba’a wa
Atharuh”
Response:
This opinion is not accurate and misleading. In fact,
composed in the most vague and prosaic of language, the
above opinion can result in serious harm. For, it opens
the door for people to be judged as non-Muslims by
anyone, who despite his/her religious commitment, fails
to understand this language. According to the above
legal opinion [by ‘Abd al-Wahhab], a Muslim who remains
unaware [of the demands of his/her religion] could be
described as “turning away from the religion of God,
neither learning nor applying it”. Such a person would
necessarily be declared an unbeliever, or that she
prefers the “guidance of [someone or something] other
than the Prophet”, if s/he did not attend a lesson in
religion when invited. By the same [intolerant] logic, a
man could be declared an unbeliever if he shaved his
beard, and so on. To judge anyone who persists in sin as
an unbeliever is the approach of the Kharijites, which
is rejected by mainstream Muslims.
Commentary:
Sins committed by a Muslim, be they deadly or trivial,
do not render a Muslim a non-believer. This is supported
by the Qur’anic verse:
“Lo! Allah pardoneth not that partners should be
ascribed unto Him. He pardoneth all save that to whom He
will”. (Q. 4:116)
And the saying of the Prophet (upon him be peace)
related by ‘Ubayda ibn al-Samat: “‘Give me your pledge
that you will associate no partner with God, that you
will never steal, or commit adultery, destroy your
children, slander, or utter a lie, and that you will
never disobey an appropriate order [i.e. one that is
given by your rightful leader]. Whoever amongst you
satisfies these things will be rewarded by God; while
those amongst who you fail to do these things, and is
[thus] punished in this life, then such punishment shall
be your atonement; while whoever amongst you fails to do
these things and your wrongdoing is concealed by God,
then it must be left to God either to forgive or to
punish you’. And we gave him [the Prophet] our pledge”.[1]
Thus acts of worship and their abandonment are listed as
other than the sin of polytheism.
The Muslim jurists drew attention to the seriousness of
pronouncing someone a disbeliever. [According to them] A
believer should not be declared an unbeliever when there
is any possibility that a mistake has been made and that
he or she is a believer. Rather, no Muslim may be judged
non-Muslim unless all scholars unanimously agree that
there is no doubt that s/he has committed an act of
disbelief, which constitutes abandoning the faith. By
the same token, s/he may not be declared non-Muslim when
there remains a possibility, no matter how far-fetched
this may be, that his/her words and deeds do not clearly
indicate a lack of belief.
The Prophet (upon him be peace) said: “Whoever wrongly
describes a man as an unbeliever or as an enemy of God
will himself be judged guilty of disbelief”. This is a
serious warning to all those who mistakenly and
recklessly rush to judge the faith of Muslims.
No one who prays in the direction of Mecca [lit: “people
of the Qibla”] may be called an unbeliever, unless he
willfully and repeatedly denies the legitimacy of
established Shari‘ah law because he would then be
denying Divine legislation. Whoever permits what is
unanimously and indisputably prohibited and judged as
sinful by the jurists of Islam, such as the eating of
pork or the committing of adultery, then such a one has
certainly become an unbeliever. Whoever also flagrantly
commits clear sinful acts like the killing of protected
ones [non-combatants] and usurps their possessions
without claiming a religious exemption or justification,
then such a person is certainly a non-believer. If the
person who commits such heinous acts claims a religious
justification like the Kharijites, such actions and
negligence do not constitute sufficient proof of
disbelief. The majority of Muslim jurists argue that,
even those Muslims who shed the blood of believers and
steal from them, may not be described as non-believers
as long as their actions are committed under a religious
justification. Likewise, the carrying out of any
prohibited act with a religious justification, in and of
itself, should not result in a person being declared
non-Muslim.
Ibn Qudama remarked: It was reported that Ibn Math’un
drank wine believing that it was permitted, so ‘Umar
applied the legal punishment to him, but refrained from
judging him as an unbeliever. The same also happened
with Abu Jundul ibn Suhail and a group of his
companions, who drank wine in the Levant believing that
it was allowed. In the latter case, they took the
following verse as proof:
“There shall be no sin (imputed) unto those who
believe and do good works for what they may have eaten”.
(Q. 5:93)
Yet, they [Abu Jundul and companions] were not judged as
unbelievers. Rather they were informed that wine is
prohibited; thereafter, they repented and the legal
punishment was applied to them. The same logic applies
to any person who commits a deed, and is unaware of its
prohibition. This person may not be judged an unbeliever
until s/he knows and acknowledges that his or her deed
is unequivocally prohibited, and thus all
misunderstanding and ambiguity has been cleared up.[2]
These carefully formulated rules, established by
critical scholars such as Ibn Qudama, provide more
reliable guidelines than the generally and vaguely
worded list mentioned above of the ten alleged
revocations of Islam. Indeed, these revocations have
encouraged many religious youth to recklessly deny
Muslims their faith, without proof or authority. And God
is the Most Knowing.
Shaykh ‘Abd Allah Wahhab ibn Nassir al-Tariri observed:
When dying, Abu al-Hasan al-‘Ashari was quoted as
saying: “Bear witness that I have not judged any of the
people of the Qibla [i.e. Muslims] to be an unbeliever;
for all follow the one God”. Imam al-Zahabi commented:
“I share the same belief”. And, in the latter stages of
his life, Shaykh Ibn Taymiyyah agreed: “I would never
judge anyone from our Umma an unbeliever”. Indeed, he [Ibn
Taymiyya] goes further when quoting from a Prophetic
hadith: “No-one performs the ritual ablution (wudu’),
but a believer”. So, on this basis, anyone who performs
their prayers and ablutions is a Muslim. Look at the
sayings of the above Imams, al-‘Ashari, al-Zahabi and
Ibn Taymiyya, who are authorities in Islamic
jurisprudence and religious doctrine. Their experience,
knowledge, and scholarship, especially of the beliefs
and dogmas of different sects, impacted deeply upon
their judgment, and have made them extremely wary of the
denial of Islam to anyone. These scholars refused to
judge any Muslim as an unbeliever. With them in mind,
how can those who have not attained their knowledge and
scholarship make such claims or pretend to be able to
pronounce judgment over the faith of others?[3]
According to the Fatwa Centre, supervised by Dr.
‘Abdullah al-Faqih:
A Muslim cannot be judged as an unbeliever unless he is
guilty of some kind of speech, action, or belief, which,
according to the Holy Book and Sunna, constitutes a
major act of disbelief, and/or that Muslim scholars
unanimously declare that his acts warrant this judgment.
The conditions making this judgment possible include the
absence of any mitigating factors: a disbeliever can
only be, therefore, an adult of sound mind, who is fully
aware that he is committing disbelief unexcused by
ignorance or based on claims of interpretation in issues
that are open to interpretation or are not widely known.
And God Almighty is the Most Knowing.
Dr. Muhammad Fouad
[2]
Ibn Qudama, al-Mughni 21/9; cf. Ibn
‘Abidin’s commentary 224/4.
[3]
Shaykh al-Tariri is a faculty member at Imam
Muhammad Ibn Sa‘ud Islamic University.