The Major Sins Series - MagicSorcery - Abu Usama 417
By Abu Usamah | 2026-01-15T16:02:02.737704+00:00 | Topic: Repentance
The Major Sins Series - Magic/Sorcery
Sheikh Abu Usama
Opening
(بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَنِ الرَّحِيمِ - bismillahir-rahmanir-rahim)
الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ، وَالصَّلَاةُ وَالسَّلَامُ عَلَى رَسُولِ اللَّهِ، أَمَّا بَعْدُ
Introduction to the Third Major Sin - Magic
Imam al-Dhahabi, may Allah have mercy upon him, states in Kitab al-Kabair (The Book of Major Sins): The third major sin is magic (as-sihr). This is because the practitioner of magic must inevitably disbelieve.
Evidence from the Quran
Allah, the Most High and Exalted, says:
"But the devils disbelieved, teaching people magic."
Allah has established in this ayah that the shayateen taught people magic, and in so doing they became disbelievers (kufr). Imam al-Dhahabi said: Because the shaytan who was cursed, his desire in teaching people magic and making them practitioners of magic is so that they will fall into shirk.
Then he brought another ayah connected to those series of ayat in which Allah is speaking about Harut and Marut, two of the angels of Allah:
"And Harut and Marut did not teach anyone except that they said: 'Verily we are a trial for you, so do not disbelieve.'"
They learned from Harut and Marut at Babylon those things which would divide a man and his woman, those things which will make discord between a man and his wife.
The Reality of Magic
The deal from that is that magic is disbelief, and as such it is a major sin from the major sins. This is clear because before Harut and Marut taught the people magic, they said to them: "We are a trial for you people, so do not disbelieve. Do not become disbelievers by learning magic and practicing magic."
After bringing these two ayat, Imam al-Dhahabi said: O brothers, many of the people unfortunately are astray as it relates to the issue of magic. Because they see magic as being something that's only prohibited, but they don't recognize that magic is something that is kufr (disbelief). It is disbelief. So they go into it and they learn it when it is a clear action of disbelief.
For example, those people who tie knots and cause a man to love his wife or cause the wife to love the husband, or cause a man to hate his wife or cause the wife to hate her husband. Most of the time when they are using these words of magic, they
are simply words that are not clear and they are ambiguous, and they entail and include shirk and falsehood.
Contemporary Examples
Imam al-Dhahabi is not living in our community, and there may be some people in the audience who may even say: "Magic? Why would he mention magic as being the third thing? And there are issues bigger than magic." When in fact there are people in our masjid right now who know other people who magic has been worked on them, or they know someone who he himself is a magician.
Unfortunately many times, when the mother of the husband has a problem with the wife, she'll put a magic potion on her daughter-in-law or she'll put a magic potion on her son in order to cause the divorce.
Two Extreme Positions Regarding Magic
There are some people from the Muslims who don't believe in magic at all, and that's another example of extremism in the religion and ignorance. They don't believe in magic and they use their intellect to deny and to reject magic.
So you have those people who practice magic, and that's overboard because the person is exceeding the limits and he's falling into transgressing the boundaries of Allah. And then you have the other extreme: those Muslims who use their intellect and they say: "I don't believe in magic. We have to be an ummah that is advanced and caught up with technology. And if we believe in magic, this is from the superstitions of the nations gone by."
Or they say: "If it is true that Rasulullah was affected by magic (mashoor), if this is possible, then that means that the Quran - we don't know what's authentic in the Quran and what's not authentic, because maybe there was an ayah that was revealed when Rasulullah was under the influence of magic." So therefore they reject magic.
Or the clear ayahs that establish magic like the issue with Harut and Marut, the issue with Sulaiman, they say: "No, how is it possible that Harut and Marut are from the angels and they came down and taught the people magic? And the angels do not fall into any sins, not to mention the major sins." So they use their intellect in order to push away the evidences that are established in the Quran.
The Correct Approach to Understanding Islam
I want to say brothers, as it relates to any text of the Quran or any hadith of Rasulullah, if there is an issue or a problem that a Muslim has with understanding some aspect of Islam, he has to be wary and afraid. He has to take it as a serious issue to find it easy to push away and discard any hadith of Rasulullah if that hadith is authentic and he doesn't understand it.
He has to say: "I am going to criticize my own understanding before I criticize the ayat that's in the Quran."
The sister, she sees that Islam has given the man or her husband many rights over her, degrees over her. So she's a revert to Islam. She says: "I don't agree with how Islam has made the man over the woman." So therefore those aspects of the man-woman relationship: "I don't see that, I don't embrace it, I don't recognize it." That's kufr.
The Muslim is a person who finds a way to say: "It's my understanding, it's my imam's understanding." He never says: "Rasulullah didn't know what he was talking about" or "The meaning of this ayah means something else other than what is being shown in the particular ayah."
Four Categories of People Who Reject Texts
Sheikh al-Islam al-Thani, Imam Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, may Allah have mercy upon him, mentioned something very important when he talked about the categories of people. We have to be careful of being from any one of these four categories of people.
He said that the people are arrogant (mutakabirun) who reject the text of the Quran and the Sunnah because they don't understand it. Maybe Allah has not chosen this time for you to understand it, but under that ayah or under that hadith there's
a treasure of information that you didn't come to know about it yet. But with some studying, with some effort, with being a student, Allah may make it apparent to you, manifest to you. Maybe not now. So before saying "I do away with the hadith," say "Let me get more knowledge, let me research the issue."
First Category: The People of Fiqh
He said the people are arrogant. The first category of arrogant people are those people who work with the fiqh of Islam, those fuqaha - not just the scholars from the fuqaha, but just the regular people in their fiqh: Maliki, Hanbali, Shafi'i, Hanafi. He's a fiqhi on his own particular level.
The text of the hadith goes against his madhab, goes against what his imam says. So he rejects the hadith even though it's authentic and he says: "My imam must have known that hadith. Since my imam didn't take with it, I'm not taking with it."
So we can't be of the arrogant ones from the fuqaha who put their intellect, who put their desires before the text.
Second Category: The People of Theology
The second group of people he said were the people from Ahl al-Kalam, the people who use their intellect. So when the text doesn't go with their intellect, they push the text away.
They say for example: "The Christian god Vishnu, or one of the gods that the Hindus believe in, they say that he's everywhere. The Hindus believe that he's everywhere. So therefore why don't we believe that Allah is everywhere? If they can do it, we can do it." That's putting his intellect before the text.
Third Category: The People of Tasawwuf
The third group of people that Ibn Qayyim mentioned were the people of tasawwuf. The people of tasawwuf who decide things are correct or incorrect based upon how it feels to them, what they call al-dhawq (the taste). If it tastes good or feels good, or something that they experience in their spiritual states, they say it's from Islam. If it doesn't taste good, then they reject it.
"We love Rasulullah," so they say: "We're going to go overboard in praising him. We're going to practice his birthday. We're going to go overboard in making a special dhikr." When you bring them the text, they say: "No, no, this doesn't go along with the dhawq, this doesn't go along with what we feel."
Fourth Category: The People of Politics
The fourth and final group of people are the politicians (siyasiyoon), the people of politics. The people of politics can be the high level of politicians who, when the Quran and the Sunnah doesn't go along with their desires, they push it away. Or the low level of politicians - the groups that busy themselves with politics. Their group is a group that calls for the khilafah, for example - everything is the khilafah, the khilafah. Or everything is jihad, jihad, and it's political behind that mindset.
Everything is something about politics.
Whenever you come to them with a text: "You have to do this or you can't do that, it's not permissible to mix, it's not permissible to do that," they say: "No, no, we can't follow that text, we can't follow that ayah, we can't follow that hadith because it doesn't go along with our goal or our desire in the politics."
So those are the four people we don't want to be from - those four categories that Imam Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyya mentioned, may Allah have mercy upon him.
Evidence from the Sunnah
After giving those two ayat from the Quran, he brought the evidence from the Sunnah of Rasulullah and the statements of the companions and the righteous predecessors (salaf as-salih).
The Ruling on Magicians
He said: The reward or the punishment for being a magician is that that individual is killed. And he's killed because that's what Umar ibn al-Khattab, may Allah be pleased with him, ordered when he was the khalifah.
He wrote a letter to the Muslims, and in that letter in the Islamic state, in the Islamic empire, he said: "Kill every single magician, man and magician woman."
Examples from the Companions
Example 1: Hafsa, may Allah be pleased with her
Our mother Hafsa, may Allah be pleased with her, had a female slave (jariyah) who put magic on Hafsa. Hafsa, may Allah be pleased with her, had her murdered, had her killed in front of her. She didn't go to the judge (hakim), she didn't go to the khalifah. She had the lady killed in front of her.
Example 2: Al-Walid ibn Uqba
In addition to that, there was a leader from the Muslims who was the brother of Uthman ibn Affan, may Allah be pleased with him. His name was Al-Walid ibn Uqba, may Allah be pleased with him.
Al-Walid made some mistakes during his leadership. He drank alcohol (khamar), he made the prayer of Fajr and he was drunk. Instead of making two rakahs, he made four rakahs.
The people who had a problem with the khilafah of Uthman, they criticized Uthman for what his brother was doing, and they made rebellion against Uthman because of his brother.
Al-Walid ibn Uqba, may Allah be pleased with him, was flogged for drinking khamar. But despite that, the companions still prayed behind him. Despite that, the companions still gave him advice and they did not make rebellion against Al-Walid.
The Incident with Jundab ibn Abdullah
Al-Walid invited a magician, O brothers, to come and to do magic in front of the people and to entertain the people. This is an authentic narration in the collection of Imam al-Tirmidhi.
The man would take a sword and he would cut his neck with the sword that was sharp, and it wouldn't make any wound, and the people were enjoying the festivities.
Upon hearing that, the companion Jundab ibn Abdullah, may Allah be pleased with him, he went, he took his sword and he chopped the man's head off in front of Walid and in front of the people.
The people got up and they started running away. Jundab ibn Abdullah said: "I don't want to kill you people, I don't want to kill you people." But he read the ayat of the Quran. He said:
"Do you people do magic while you're watching? Do you, the magician, are you doing magic while you people are watching?"
That's an ayat of the Quran.
Salman al-Farisi, may Allah be pleased with him, heard about the incident. Salman said: "It wasn't befitting for Walid to bring the people to watch the magician because he's an imam and the leader who the people follow. And it wasn't befitting for Jundab ibn Abdullah, may Allah be pleased with them all, to come and take the sword out in the presence of the khalifah."
So those are clear proofs that show us that as-sihr, the one who is a practitioner of as-sihr, he is to be killed.
Clarifying an Important Point
Someone may ask the question, O brothers, and it would be an intelligent question, and that is: How is it possible that Hafsa, may Allah be pleased with her, can kill her slave without raising the issue to the authority? And how is it possible that Jundab ibn Abdullah, may Allah be pleased with him, can come and take a man's life without the authority? How is that possible?
Especially in light of the fact that we've mentioned from the correct methodology, from the Islam that is authentic, is that it is forbidden for any of us to go out and to take the affairs into our own hands. It is forbidden for someone to go out and to perform or execute an honor killing, even if the person we want to kill deserves to be killed because that person did something to his family or something to him that Islam will give the ruling that he's killed. It's not for any of us to execute the rulings of the prescribed punishments unless obviously someone comes into your home and you protect yourself, someone tries to harm you in the street and you protect yourself, and in the process you kill him. That's okay. But to go out and to look for the thief or the murderer, this is not permissible.
So how is it possible that Hafsa had the lady killed? Because people will take these examples, O brothers, and for our young brothers who want to practice Islam and spread the Sunnah, they'll show you this authentic hadith and then you think it's okay to go out and to assassinate someone who doesn't agree with you.
The Answer
The answer to that is simple. The Prophet has allowed in Islam: If a person has a slave, it is permissible for that person who owns a slave to establish the prescribed punishment on his slave. That's permissible, and it happened during the time of Rasulullah on a number of occasions. So the permissibility of it is restricted, it is constricted, it is tight.
He says in an authentic hadith that's been collected by Imam al-Bukhari and Muslim:
إِذَا زَنَتْ أَمَةُ أَحَدِكُمْ فَتَبَيَّنَ زِنَاهَا فَلْيَجْلِدْهَا وَلَا يُثَرِّبْ ، ثُمَّ إِنْ زَنَتْ ثَانِيَةً فَلْيَجْلِدْهَا وَلَا يُثَرِّبْ، ثُمَّ إِنْ زَنَتْ ثَالِثًا فَلْيَبِعْهَا وَلَوْ بِحَبْلٍ مِنْ شَعْرٍ
"If the slave girl of one of you commits adultery and her adultery is apparent and proven, then flog her. And if she does it a second time, then flog her. And if she does it a third time, then sell her, even for the meager price of a piece of rope." (Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim)
So he allowed that to happen.
Imam al-Bukhari in his book Al-Adab al-Mufrad, he brought the circumstance in which the blind companion who was in love with his slave girl - he wasn't married to her but she was his slave girl and he loved her because of the benefit that he received from her - but she used to curse Rasulullah.
And the man would warn her: "You better stop saying that." And the lady would continue to curse Rasulullah. He knocked her down on the ground and got on top of her and split her head open with an axe and killed her.
They took the situation to Rasulullah and told him the story. When he heard what she was doing, making insult and cursing of Rasulullah, which is disbelief, Rasulullah said:
أَلَا إِنَّ دَمَهَا هَدَرٌ
"Verily her blood is permissible (to shed). Her blood is free to flow."
Hadith Evidence on Magic
Imam al-Dhahabi brought the hadith of Rasulullah on the authority of Abu Musa al-Ash'ari, may Allah be pleased with him.
The Prophet said:
"Three people will not enter into Paradise: the one who is addicted to alcohol, the person who breaks the tie of relationship, and the person who believes in magic and the magician."
The first person is the one who is addicted to alcohol. He is addicted to narcotics, and alcohol also includes all kinds of drugs and narcotics.
The second person is the person who breaks the tie of relationship, whoever that relationship may be. He breaks the tie of relationship - this is a major sin from the major sins.
And finally, and this is the point of evidence (shahid), the person who believes in magic and the magician. He goes to the magician, he goes to the soothsayer, and he believes in what that individual has said.
The Prophet also said:
"Whoever has relationships with a woman while she is on her menses, and whoever has relationships with a woman in her anus, and anyone who goes to a soothsayer and then believes what they say - they have disbelieved in what was revealed upon Muhammad."
So O brothers, the magic and the practicing of magic is a major sin from the major sins because it is disbelief, and the one who practices it is having the threat of being killed in the religion of Islam.
Important Guidelines from Imam al-Dhahabi
Finally, Imam al-Dhahabi closes out the chapter, O brothers, with what I believe is some speech that should be translated word for word and it should be passed out. And it shows the benefit of this book - it is just not the book of major sins, it is a book of hadith and the sciences of hadith, and most importantly it is a book of creed (aqidah) and a book of methodology (minhaj).
Because he ends the chapter with some tremendously important words that we are not going to read all of it, but we are going to share with you some of it.
Comparison with Sheikh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah's Approach
He said: "Listen to this statement and compare Imam al-Dhahabi to some of the people who are calling to Islam today and to some of the people who claim to follow the way of the righteous predecessors (salafiyyah) and the way they are practicing Islam and calling to the way of the salaf."
And I remind you that Sheikh al-Islam Ibn Qayyim was the student of Ibn Taymiyyah. Ibn Taymiyyah, when he came and he started his call, may Allah have mercy upon him, he had a lot of enemies. Because he was inviting the ummah to come back to the Quran and the Sunnah and the understanding of the predecessors of the ummah from the companions, may Allah be pleased with them.
And whenever you do that, you are going to have enemies because of the four categories that were mentioned: the people of theology and intellect, the people of the sufi paths, the people who want to have the fiqh according to what the madhab and the imam said.
And the imam Sheikh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah called the people back to the unadulterated Quran and Sunnah. So everybody was against him. But he used to not deal with the people the way they dealt with him. They used to lie against him and he didn't lie against them.
Example: Ibn Battuta's False Accusation
Ibn Battuta, everyone knows Ibn Battuta. He was an Arab man who traveled all over the world and his trips are recorded in books. Ibn Battuta, he got on the pulpit and he hated Ibn Taymiyyah so much because he established the correct creed. He said: "Ibn Taymiyyah was a person who believed that Allah comes down in the third part of the night the way I come down off of the pulpit."
So he got off of the pulpit and he came down. He said: "I heard Ibn Taymiyyah do that and I saw him do it."
And when he said that, Ibn Taymiyyah at that particular time was in prison. He wasn't even there. Ibn Taymiyyah wasn't able to give a sermon anywhere. So the people who were his enemies used to lie against him.
Ibn Qayyim's Relationship with His Teacher
Ibn Taymiyyah was the direct teacher and sheikh of Ibn al-Qayyim. And you see Ibn Taymiyyah's teachings rubbing off on Ibn al-Qayyim.
Ibn al-Qayyim said here in closing out this chapter, showing the mercy that they used to have for this ummah, because the people of the Sunnah are the most knowledgeable people about the truth and the most merciful people upon the creation:
He said: "You should know that the major sins as an issue - and the majority of the major sins - most of the Muslims of this ummah, they don't even know about the impermissibility of many of the major sins. And it has not reached them the seriousness of the issue because they don't read, they don't know."
He went on to say: "So as it relates to the Muslims, there are some details that need to be known when we look at them, when we judge them. You can't judge everyone the same way."
He said: "There's some distinction (tafsil), some distinctions that you have to know when passing judgment."
Dealing with Ignorant Muslims with Mercy
He said: "Therefore it is necessary for the scholar and the one who knows not to rush when he's dealing with the ignorant person from the Muslims. He has to have mercy upon him. He has to be easy with him. And he has to teach him from what Allah has taught him, especially as it relates to those people who are new to Islam and they've just recently left ignorance (jahiliyyah)."
A person who grew up in the country where there's disbelief in his place - it is not the country in the city of Islam. He was captured as a slave and forcefully taken to the Islamic lands. He was purchased by an Amir who was Turkish, or he himself is a non-Arab. So he's brought and he doesn't know the Arabic language. And as a result of that, he has no knowledge whatsoever about his religion.
"So this is the way we are to deal with the Muslims."
Example: The Woman Who Led Jumu'ah Prayer
Even that lady in America, two, three weeks ago, who insisted on praying the prayer of Jumu'ah with the Muslims the way she did. By Allah, O brothers, we say when she did what she did, that's a major sin from the major sins. But we know people like that are from the most ignorant people in the world.
Before passing the ruling of declaring someone a disbeliever (takfir) on her, before saying that the lady is from the CIA or the FBI, we have to establish the argument against her and every other Muslim before saying a person is a disbeliever. Because the companions of Rasulullah, by Allah, they did worse than that. There are examples where they did worse than the lady leading the prayer in the Jumu'ah prayer, and yet they didn't disbelieve.
Examples from the Companions
Example 1: Muadh ibn Jabal's Prostration
Muadh ibn Jabal was sent by Rasulullah to Yemen to give dawah to Allah. He went to Yemen and he called the people to Islam for a number of years. And then he heard that Rasulullah is going to make Hajj this year. Yemen is close to Mecca, closer to Mecca than Madinah where he was.
So he traveled to meet Rasulullah in Mecca. When he saw Rasulullah, his beloved, the one who he loved more than anything else in the world, he couldn't help himself except that he wanted to respect him. So he fell down and made prostration (sajdah) to Rasulullah.
Everyone knows that a prostration is for Allah alone. Everyone knows that Muadh ibn Jabal, from his special characteristics on the Day of Judgment, Muadh will come and he'll carry the flag and he'll be in front of all of the scholars, because he's a scholar from this ummah.
And yet Muadh made prostration to Rasulullah. Rasulullah was shocked and amazed. He said: "O Muadh, Muadh, what are you doing?"
Muadh said: "O Rasulullah, in Yemen those people, whenever they meet and greet the respected from amongst them, they make prostration to them. So I'm using analogy (qiyas). You are better than those people they make prostration to. Since they make prostration to them and you're better than them, I shall make prostration to you."
Everyone knows this story. The Prophet said: "If I was going to order someone to make prostration to someone else, I would have ordered the woman to make prostration to her husband."
That's disbelief and that's shirk. But Muadh did not go outside of Islam.
Example 2: Hatib ibn Abi Balta'ah's Letter
Allah has mentioned in the Quran in so many ayahs: "Don't take the Jews and the Christians as helpers. Muslims, they are helpers one to another. And whoever takes them as a helper, he's from them."
The companion of Rasulullah, Hatib ibn Abi Balta'ah, wrote a letter to the disbelievers preparing them to fight Rasulullah. He helped them directly to kill Rasulullah, to fight, to prepare, to get ready.
Umar said: "O Rasulullah, he's a hypocrite (munafiq), let me chop his head off."
Rasulullah did not say: "O Umar, he's not a hypocrite." That was an action of the hypocrites. No one can say anything or do something that's forbidden in his presence except that he has to put the best construction to it.
Umar said: "He's a hypocrite, let me kill him."
He didn't say he's not a hypocrite. He asked him: "Why did you do that?"
He told him: "O Rasulullah, you know in Mecca, I have my family, I have my money. No one is there to protect them. I wrote the letter to them hoping that they will give me a break, they will help me, they'll leave my money and my family alone."
So the Prophet said: "He's from the people of Badr. Maybe Allah looked over the deeds of the people of Badr and told them: Do whatever you want to do."
So O brothers, what Hatib ibn Abi Balta'ah did is helping the disbelievers, not over the Muslims only, but over Rasulullah. But he had a reason that he did it. And even though it was still a crime and it was wrong, nevertheless he was excused. He had an excuse, and there are too many examples of that.
Example 3: Aisha's Question About Allah's Knowledge
Rasulullah went to visit the people in the graveyard (Baqi) to visit the dead people. After coming into the home of Aisha, may Allah be pleased with her, he lay down in bed, took his clothes off, took his shoes off. He lay there until he thought that Aisha fell asleep.
When he thought she slept, he got up, took his clothes, took his shoes, closed the door very quietly and he went. She followed him.
She said in the hadith: "I put on my head covering (khimar) and I put on my face veil (niqab) and I tightened my waistband." Another clear evidence that the niqab was obligatory upon the wives of Rasulullah.
She said: "I followed him to the graveyard. I saw him raise his hands three times. And then when he turned, I turned. When he ran, I ran. When he came and he got in the bed, I was breathing hard."
So he said: "O Aisha, why are you breathing like that?"
She said: "Nothing, nothing is wrong with me."
He said: "If you don't tell me, Allah is going to tell me."
And then she told him the story: "I thought you were going to go to one of your wives' home."
She was asked by Rasulullah:
أَظَنَنْتِ أَنْ يَحِيفَ اللَّهُ وَرَسُولُهُ عَلَيْكِ يَا عَائِشَةُ
"O Aisha, did you think that Allah and His Messenger would oppress you and not deal justly with you?"
Before, when Aisha told him, he said: "If you don't tell me, Allah is going to tell me."
Aisha said: "O Rasulullah, do you mean to tell me Allah knows what's in the hearts of the people?"
Aisha didn't know that Allah knows everything. She thought maybe Rasulullah would be unjust, unfair. That's disbelief, that's not permissible. But yet she didn't go outside of the religion of Islam.
The Point: Establishing the Proof
The point, O brothers, the companions used to fall into a lot of issues. And Imam al-Dhahabi here is teaching us in the book of major sins: When the Muslims fall into the major sins, like the major sin of magic, it was something that was prevalent during his time and it's prevalent now. People go into the soothsaying and other than that.
It would be going overboard, exceeding the limits for us to pronounce disbelief (takfir) on people without the proper explanation (tafsir), without making distinctions between who's doing what and why they are doing it.
Clarification: Not Everyone Is Excused
Does that mean, O brothers, that every individual who does something that's disbelief, he is excused in the religion? It doesn't mean that. So we have to be balanced.
There are certain things that people say and do - if people do them, they are not excused. Iblis said in the Quran in the issue with Adam:
"I am better than him. You created me from fire and You created him from clay." (Quran 7:12)
That was wrong. He made interpretation (ta'wil), but that wasn't an excuse from him. None of the knowledge had to be brought to him.
There are certain things that people say and do that's not permissible. If someone takes this Quran and he uses the Quran for toilet tissue or as toilet paper, there's no excuse for a person in something like that. That's disbelief. Who in his right mind with the correct natural disposition (fitrah) is going to take the Quran and throw it inside of the toilet? No one except the person who has filth in his heart.
But in general, the Muslims, we have to establish the argument upon them:
"And We would not punish until We send a Messenger (a warner)." (Quran 17:15)
"And whoever contradicts and opposes the Messenger after the right path has been shown clearly to him, and follows other than the way of the believers..." (Quran 4:115)
Questions and Answers
There's some more words but we're going to stop here because we want to stop exactly at the designated time, insha'Allah, today. So we're going to stop here with this major sin of magic, and next week, insha'Allah, is the major sin of abandoning the prayer (tarq as-salat) in Islam.
Question 1: How to Deal with Magic If Someone Has Performed It Against Us
Answer:
You do what the Prophet did. And that is: read the protective verses (al-mu'awwidhatain), the two surahs that were read for Salat al-Maghrib today - Surat al-Falaq and Surat an-Nas.
When the magic was worked on him by the Jew Labid ibn al-A'sam, that particular man, Rasulullah didn't kill him. So some people dispute that the magician should be killed because Rasulullah did not kill the man who made magic on him.
But he didn't kill the man for a number of reasons - weighing the benefits and the harms. Had he killed the man, it could have been a problem. So he didn't kill the man, just as he didn't kill the Jewish lady who poisoned him. She tried to kill Rasulullah, tried to take a life that was forbidden for her to take - the life of a Prophet. But it was balanced in terms of the good and the evil. So that is not an evidence.
When that man put magic on Rasulullah and the lady who was a magician from the Jews put magic on Rasulullah (the knots), Allah sent two angels to him and revealed those two ayahs.
So reading the Quran, especially the last two surahs of the Quran, reading also the other parts of the Quran.
Protection from Magic
Those of you who go to Umrah and to Mecca for Hajj, there is a type of date that will protect you from magic which is called al-Ajwa.
So instead of spending all of your time in the marketplace, purchase the Ajwa date. Rasulullah said:
"Whoever wakes up in the morning and he eats seven dates of al-Ajwa that are from Madinah, he eats seven dates of al-Ajwa every morning, he won't be hit, he won't be afflicted by magic or poison. Magic or poison."
Someone might say: "What does a date have to do with magic? I don't take that, I don't believe that." Maybe there is some knowledge in there, a treasure that you don't know about yet.
From the protections of magic, obviously, are supplications (dua), especially for the children. The dua that the Prophet used to make upon his children or his grandchildren.
Question 2: Are Card Tricks and Similar Tricks Magic? Should We Refrain From Them?
Answer:
Yes, we should refrain from them. But the scholars have differed (ikhtilaf) in their sleight of hand.
There are those scholars who say that it's magic and you should be killed and it's a major sin from the major sins. Others say this is not the magic, this is not the magic that is forbidden where you are killed. It's forbidden because it's lying, it's deception, it's playing games.
But the trickery of the eye is not considered to be the magic that the Quran is talking about.
In the issue that we dealt with today, the magic of Pharaoh's magicians, the magic of Pharaoh, as Allah says in the Quran:
"Those magicians, they put magic on the eyes of the people and made the people afraid, and they came with a great example of magic." (Quran 7:116)
They made the snake look like it was moving, but it was just from the imagination (takhayyulat), from the imagination. What appeared like that, but it wasn't real.
People can do their finger some way and make it look like he took his finger off. They elevate themselves off of the ground. Those are optical illusions and trickery. That's not the magic that a person is killed for with the majority of the scholars of Islam. But it should be avoided in either case.
Question 3: How Can Harut and Marut Teach People What's Forbidden and They Are Angels?
Answer:
It's known, O brothers, that the angels, as Allah described them in the Quran:
"They do not disobey Allah in what He commands them, and they do what they are ordered to do." (Quran 66:6)
So this ayah explains: the angels who are over the Hellfire and other than them, they do not disobey Allah and they do what they are ordered to do. They don't disobey Allah. They don't have the propensity and the ability to disobey Allah. There's no disobedience with them. And they do what they are ordered to do.
So Allah ordered them to go and teach the people magic as a trial (fitna), as a test (imtihan), as a trial. And before teaching them, they said, as the ayah said: "We are a trial to you, so don't disbelieve."
That's the first answer, and what seems to be the strongest position: they do what Allah ordered them to do.
Making prostration to anyone and anything is shirk and forbidden. But when Allah said to the angels:
"And when We said to the angels: 'Prostrate to Adam,' they prostrated except Iblis." (Quran 2:34)
They made prostration when Allah ordered them to make prostration. Prostration is forbidden unless Allah orders you. Killing is forbidden unless Allah orders you. So we are like the angels in that issue - we just follow, we hear and we obey.
Alternative Understanding
The second issue, and this is important as well, is that some of the scholars don't believe that Harut and Marut taught magic. They believe that Harut and Marut taught the people monotheism (tawheed) and faith (iman), and that magic was forbidden by the text of the ayat itself.
And it goes to show the importance of the Arabic language. They understand the ayah like this:
The devils were teaching. During the time of Sulaiman, Sulaiman didn't disbelieve, but the devils disbelieved. They taught the people magic. And Harut and Marut did not - no magic was revealed on Harut and Marut.
So some of the scholars understand the ayat like that:
And nothing of magic was sent down on these two angels from Allah.
But the first position seems to be the strongest position: that they did what Allah ordered them to do.
Question 4: What Is the General Advice for Our Children Reading Books and Stories of Magic?
Answer:
As is the case of many children's books, they're books that we purchased for them, O brothers. We shouldn't purchase them for them and we should teach them that it's not permissible.
Some of the most famous books contain magic in them. Jack and the Beanstalk is a book of magic and a book of superstitions, as we mentioned before.
Jack and the Beanstalk - the beans that Jack purchased were magic beans that made the thing grow up and it went all the way up into the sky where the giant lived up there. And the goose was laying the golden eggs that Jack went up to steal from the goose. And then he ran down and chopped the tree, and then when the giant came down he fell and Jack murdered the giant.
So obviously, O brothers, this is stretching the situation. This is stretching it, but that's the story.
So instead of preoccupying and busying our children with the stories of superstitions and magic, we sit them down and we explain to them why magic is forbidden and what is magic. We explain to them that Adam, our father, used to be a giant, and that the people of Thamud used to be giants, and they used to do this and so forth and so on. We teach them the religion. Killing is forbidden, stealing is forbidden. Why did Jack try to... we turn a corner, but we make sure that we teach them: these stories are not true, they're from superstitions, and Islam is better.
Will we take what is worse? Will we change what's better for what is worse, as the Jews wanted to do so many times in the Quran?
Question 5: The Story About Imam al-Dhahabi Warning Against Imam Ibn Taymiyyah - Is This True?
Answer:
This is a lie that was presented by a number of the people who were enemies to Ibn Taymiyyah, recently and in the past.
One famous imam who was a scholar of this religion from the Shafi'i madhab, who used to get Ibn Taymiyyah arrested a lot - he was the main judge in the area - Imam al-Subki, who wrote the famous book Tabaqat ash-Shafi'i. Tremendous scholar in Islam, bonafide scholar in Islam. But he had some issues, he had personal problems with Imam Ibn Taymiyyah.
So if they can have problems, why can't people today have problems from the scholars? They have problems between themselves. And it's not permissible for you and I to make loyalty and disownment (wala wa bara) based on the problems that are clearly personal between scholars.
The Three Divorces Issue
Imam Ibn Taymiyyah, when he said that the three divorces - "your divorce, your divorce, your divorce" - in one setting, he said: "No, if someone divorces his wife like that, it only counts as one, as it used to be during the time of Rasulullah and then during the time of Abu Bakr."
And then during the time of Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, the people who did it a lot - so Umar, being the khalifah, he said: "If you people do this, it's going to count as three." Because the people became lackadaisical and they became too easy with this.
When Imam al-Subki heard this fatwa of Ibn Taymiyyah, he arrested him, had him arrested and put him in prison. Got out of the prison.
The Traveling to Graves Issue
So the troublemakers asked Ibn Taymiyyah some more questions: "Is it permissible for a person to leave Britain, to ride his horse, to ride a plane, and to go to Baitul Maqdis, to go to Baitul Maqdis to visit the grave of Khalil Ibrahim (the close friend of Allah) or to go to the grave of Rasulullah, and his intention is to visit the grave?"
He said: "It's not permissible. You can't travel to any grave. You only can travel to the three mosques." Put him in prison. Locked him up again.
So Imam al-Subki, may Allah have mercy upon him and forgive us and him, he was the one who wrote this thing and attributed that Imam Ibn Qayyim had a problem with his sheikh Ibn Taymiyyah.
Ibn Qayyim's Relationship with His Teacher
But that doesn't mean, O brothers, that Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, may Allah have mercy upon him, did not refute Ibn Taymiyyah. He would refute his sheikh. And he had a famous statement that we should memorize and we should say. And he said:
"Sheikh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah is our beloved (habib), we love him. But the truth (al-haqq) or the truth itself is more beloved to us than he is."
And then he would go and make his point and refute the point of his sheikh, may Allah have mercy upon him.
And that was the training (tarbiyah) of Ibn Taymiyyah to all of his students. And then after Ibn Qayyim, his students dealt with him like that. Al-Dhahabi dealt with him like that. And everyone dealt with him like that.
So as it relates to this issue of Imam al-Dhahabi and Imam Ibn Taymiyyah criticizing each other and making these statements, it is not true.
Question 6: About Ibn Taymiyyah Establishing Body Parts to Allah
The last thing that I want to make about this point, I don't know if it was in this masjid, but it seems to be quite recent. Could have been in London over the weekend.
Someone said the question was asked in London in Masjid al-Huda in Whitechapel, our Somalian community. Someone wrote a question and said: "Is it true that Ibn Taymiyyah, may Allah have mercy upon him, established body parts to Allah - everything except the private part? Because I heard that that's what people are saying - that he had Allah... Ibn Taymiyyah believed that Allah was everything that a human being is except the private part."
Well, if he's going to establish all of that, now why not establish the private part as well?
It's a lie. A lie that's made up by people who, subhanAllah, they don't like the pure monotheism (tawheed) and the pure creed (aqeedah), so they're against his people.
This is the last question, insha'Allah.
Question 7: The Blue Eye
Answer:
The blue eye? Some people put the blue eye of a blue stone in their cars, in their windows, in their homes to protect from the evil eye.
We don't know anything that is authentic from the Sunnah that has this type of instruction being given to us.
The evil eye is true, as the Prophet told us. The evil eye is true. But the way we ward off the evil eye is holding on to our religion.
And if someone is afflicted with it, he goes and asks that individual to take a shower, and he takes from that water and he bathes in the water that the person who he thinks or believes gave him the evil eye.
Important Clarification About Magic and Weak Iman
Another point, O brothers, is we reject the statement that some of the people say that have good intentions when they want to encourage us to hold on to our religion. They say: "Magic can only affect the individual who has weak faith (iman) - he doesn't pray, he doesn't fast, he doesn't wear the hijab, not holding on to the religion."
No, that is not a true statement. It's not true just like that. If anyone can be affected, it's definitely the one who is weak in his faith, for sure. But magic and the evil eye can afflict the person who is the imam of the righteous ones (muttaqeen), like it happened with our Prophet and our Messenger.
But the stronger the person's faith is, and the stronger his reliance on Allah (tawakkul) is, and the stronger his certainty in Allah (yaqeen billah) is, then obviously the less he's going to open the door for Shaytan to preoccupy him.
Wisdom of the Prophet Being Afflicted with Magic
So what is the wisdom that Allah allowed Rasulullah to be hit and afflicted with magic?
One of the clear wisdoms is so that we'll know what to do if it happens to us.
Another of the clear wisdoms is to prove, O brothers: Rasulullah is not from the light (nur) of Allah. Rasulullah is a human being (bashar). Can Allah become affected by magic? Can Allah have magic worked on Him?
This is from the clearest evidences and proofs for us to hold on to worshiping Allah and using Rasulullah as the vehicle that showed us how to worship Allah. The light of Allah cannot become affected by magic.
And also from the wisdom of that is that the Prophet, the more trials (ibtila) you have in this world, the higher your place is going to be. So his trial was severe, to the point that when he was affected by magic, when he had the magic worked on him, he would prepare to make ghusl (ritual bath).
And our mother Aisha, may Allah be pleased with her, would say: "Where you going, Rasulullah?"
He said: "I'm going to make ghusl because we have relationships."
She said: "We didn't have relationships."
He thought he had relationships and he didn't have relationships. It was to that level and that degree.
Final Advice About Magic
The last thing about magic, O brothers: Every nosebleed doesn't mean you have magic on you. Every headache doesn't mean you have magic on you. That's how some of us are.
We have mental problems. We have those who make ablution (wudu) - obsessive whispers (wiswas) - he keeps making wudu. Then we have the people who are paranoid: "He's giving me the evil eye. She put the magic on me. No, I'm not going to visit them and I'll break the ties of relations because they put the magic. The child died, they put the magic on me."
Now this is not from the religion of Islam. There are ways to know that people have put magic on you, and there are ways to know that you are not a person who has magic but instead you have a chemical imbalance and you need some medical treatment. You need to go see professional people.
So you have to determine when and how that is, and there are people who know how to do that, O brothers.
Warning About Superstitious Practices
Stay away from the spiritual guide (pir) who has superstitions. The pir who has superstitions - you want to go and he writes you a potion and he burns it and you drink it.
You go and she says: "I have headaches, I have bad headaches," so the pir tells the people: "Paint the room all red, get a red blanket on the bed, make the carpet red, paint the door red, the pillow red, and then it's going to go away."
What is that, O brothers? The same people who tell us: "I don't believe that people can go to the moon. If they did go to the moon, let them go to the moon on the first day when the moon is small. They can't step on the moon, they'll fall off."
That's how people are. Don't take your religion from those people, O brothers.
Closing
So we're going to stop here, insha'Allah.
May Allah guide us to the truth and protect us from all major sins. Ameen.