WHAT IS SLANDER WHAT IS SLANDER? Know, 0 dear readers, that the meaning of Namimah or slander is to take the faults of one to the ears of another, for instance, a certain man is speaking thus about you, The man to whom it is communicated and the man whose fault is communicated both dislike it. A third person also does not like it, though it is expressed by hints, gestures, writings and by other means. But if benefit is done to a Muslim by diclosing it, there is no fault in it. For instance, if a man sees a thing of a man being stolen, he should bear witness. The hearer of this slander or defamation has got six duties to perform. (1) He should not believe the slanderer as he is a transgressor and sinner and his evidence is to be rejected. God says : 0 believer, if a transgressor comes to you with a news, test its correctness, lest you injure a people out of ignorance-49 : 6 Q. (2) He should prevent him from making defamation, advise him and say to him that it is a great sin. God says : Enjoin good, and prohibit evil. (3) He shall hate such person within mind for Gods sake, as he is hated by God. To hate one whom God haes is compulsory. (4) He shall not entertain bad idea against his brother Muslim, as God says : Give up most conjectures as some conjecture is sin. (5) He shall not be busy in seeking the truth of that new, as God says Dont spy. (6) He shall not disclose his defamation and say : Such a person told me such and such. It has been narrated that a person came to Caliph Omar-b-Abdul Aziz and said something to him against a person. The Caliph then said to him: If you desire. I will verify you a statement. If you tell lie, you are a great sinner according to this verse of God : If anybody comes to you with a news, verify it. If you tell the truth, you are a slanderer according to this verse-those who roam with slander-68 : 11 If you duster, I will pardon you. He said: 0 Commander of the faithful, I want pardon. I will never do it. Hazrat Hasan Basari said : H who defames a man to you defames you also to another. It appears from this that wrath should be shown to the defamer and he should not be believed. The Prophet said : He is worst whose harms the people fear. He also said : One whb severse the tie of relationship will not enter Paradise. He was questioned : Who is the severer of connection. He said : He who severer connection from the people and he who defames. A man one day defamed a man to Hazrat Ali. Hazrat Ali said to him: 0 brother, I shall enquire about what you have said. We shall hate you if you tell the truth and punish you if you tell falsehood and pardon you if you want it. The man said : 0 Commander of the faithful, pardon me. Muhammad-b-Kaab was once asked : Which conduct of a believer is harmful to him? He said : Excessive talk, disclose of secrets and belief in everybodys words. Mussb- b-Jubair said : To believe in defamation is worse than defamation, as defamation shows the way but belief in defamation gives permission. He who shows the path to a thing is not equal to one who admits it and gives permission. So beware of slanderers and defamers. Once a man sought permission of Calips Solaiman to speak. permission was granted and the man said : 0 Commander of the faithful, some men defamed you. They purchased your world in exchange of their religion and gained your pleasure in earning the displeasure of God. They fear you in matters of God and does not fear God in your matters. So dont trust them for the trust which God has given you and dont band over to them the thing which God has given you to protect, as they will spread harm a among the people and will destroy you by the help of their relatives. Their aims are rebellion and slander, their means are backbiting and defamation. You are responsible for their guilts and they are not responsible for your guilts. Their world will not be good if they destroy your next world because the worst deception is that of a man who sells his next world in exchange of the world of another. The wise Luqman advised his son: 0 dear son, I am giving you such admonitions which, if you stick to, you will not be deprived of influence : Treat well with the near and the distant ones, dont express your ignorance to the persons of honour and dishonoursave your friends, keep the tie of relationship with you relatives, save them from the deception of a slanderer and save yourself from one who wishes harm to you and to play deceit. When you part away from your friends and they part from you, dont tell their evil and they also shall not tell your evil. A pious man said : The root of slander is falsehood, envy and hypocrisy. These three things are the root of disgrace. The sage Hammad-b-Salmah said : A man purchased a slave. The seller said to the buyer : He has got no fault in him except one which is double-dealing. The buyer said : I am satisfied. Then he purchased him. After some days stay with his master, the slave said to his wife : Your husband does not love you and he wants to purchase a slave-girl. I am telling you of a spell. When he falls asleep, take some hairs of his beard with a razor. I shall prepare with them such a spell that he will love you. He then went to the husband and said to him : Your wife does not love you and fell in love of another person. She may kill you if opportunity arises. One day, the master fell asleep and his wife went with a razor to take some hairs of his beard. When she was about to take them, he suddenly awoke and caught her with the razor and killed her. This news reached her relatives who came at once and killed him. Thus quarrels ensued between the triple of the husband and the tribe of the wife. (17) Hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is another evil of tongue. It is to go to two enemies and introduce to each of them as friend and to hold one opinion with each of them. The sage Ammer-b- Yasar said that the Prophet had said : He who has got two tongues in the world will have two tongues in the next world. The Prophet said : You will see on the resurrection day the worst man near God with two faces. He will come to one party with one thing and to another party with another thing. In another narration he will come with one face to one party and with another face to another party. Hazrat Abu Hurairah said : A man having two faces will not be enrolled as a faithful man to God. Malek-b-Dinar said : I have read in the Torah : He who talks with his friend with two tongues and yet claims to be a trustee, God will destroy that tongue. The Prophet said : On the Resurrection Day, the worst men to God will be the liars, the proud, and those men who entejtained hatred in the need of their friends. When they met his friends, they hated them. When they were called towards God and His Prophet, they came late and when they were called towards the devil, they came hurriedly. It has been narrated that when a companion of the Prophet died. Hazrat Huzalfa did not say funeral prayer for him. Hazrat Omar then said: He is one of the companions of the Prophet, but you have not said his funeral prayer. He said : 0 Commander of the faithful, he is one of the hypocrites. Hazrat Omar said : I ask you : am I included among them ? He said : You are not a hypocrite, Nobody after you can be trusted. (18) Praise. Another evil of the tongue is to praise. In some cases, praise is unlawF. There are six harms of praise, out of which four harms fall on the praiser and two harms fall on the hearer of praise. (1) Faleshood is the first harm. In case of too much priase, recourse must be had to falsehood. Khated-b-Medan said : If a man praises a ruler or such man as has not got that quality in him, God will raise him in such a way that it will be difficult for him to talk to the people with tongue. (2) Show The second harm at the time of praise is show, as love is expressed by praise but it may not be in mind and he may not believe in all he says. Thus he shows a show or hypocrisy. (3) The praised man is praised without knowing whether he has that quality in him. It is reported that a certain man praised another before the Prophet. The Prophet then said to them : You have severed the neck of your brother. If he hears it, he will not get salvation. Then he said : If you are to praise a man, say I know him as such God knows whether he is pure or impure. I cant say in excess of what God knows of anybody So it is danger to say that he is a pious man, he is God-fear, he is a pilanthropist. Once Hazrat Omar saw a man praising another. He asked the praiser : Have you travelled with him ? He said : No. He asked him: Have you carried on business with him ? He said : No. He asked him Are you his neighbour morning and evening ? He said : No. He said : By God, I think you have not known him. (4) The praised man may be an oppressor or a great sinner. To praise him in such circumstances is unlawful. The Prophet said When a great sinner is praised, God then becomes displeased. Hazrat Hasan Basari said : He who wishes long life of an oppressor, disobeys God in His world. The praised man gets two harms by the praise. It gives pride in him and he feels self praise. These two things are ruinous. Hazrat Hasan Basari said : One day Hazrat Omar was seated with a stick among the people, when a man Zarat-b-Munzer came there. One of those present said. This man is the chief of Rabiah tribe. Hazrat Omar and those around him heard it. When he came near Hazrat Omar, he was brandishing his stick over his head. At this the man said : 0 Commander of the Faithful, what sort of treatment is this ? He said : Have you not heard what that man said about you ? He said: Yes, I have heard it. Hazrat Omar said : I feared that praise may grow in you a sense of pride. For that I destroyed it by the show of strike by this stick. (2) The second harm is that when a man praises another, the latter becomes pleased and finds solace and as such gives up self-improvement, as he understand that he has reached the limit of progress. He who understands that he has got faults, tries for improvement of his character. For this rason, the Prophet said You have severed his neck. If he possesses it, he will not get salvation. The Prophet said : If you praise a man in his face, think that you are passing sharp knife round his neck. The Prophet said It is better to attack a man with sharp sword than to praise a man before his face. Hazrat Omar said : Praise is like murdered as the murdered person is saved from the responsibility of actions. Praise grows idleness or self-praise and pride. Both are destructive like murder. If the prasier and the praised are saved from these harms then there is no fault in praise. For this reason, the Prophet praised his companions. He said about Hazrat Abu Bakr : If the faith of Abu Bakr is measured with the faith of the people of the world, his faith will be heavier. he said regarding Hazrat Omar If I was not sent as a Prophet, Omar would have been sent as a Prophet. By this praise, they did not become proud. The Prophet said : I am the leader of the children of Adam and there is no boast in it. In other words, I am not telling it out of pride. When the people once were praising a dead man, the Prophet said : He is fit to receive praise. The sage Mozahed said : There are friends for the children of Adam from the angels. When any Muslim mentions about the good works of another Muslim, the angels says : 0 son of Adam, keep your mysteries of secrets secret, be pleased with your affairs and praise God who has kept your hidden things secret. DUTIES OF THE PRAISED MAN: The praised man must save himself from pride, self-praise and idlences, He will not be able to save himself from these evils unless he thinks about his ultimate end and the result of his actions. The praiser does not know what the praised man knows about him. The former will surely not praise him if he knows of him what he knows of himself. The Prophet said : Throw dust at the face of the praisers. The sage Sufiyan-b- Aynah said : He who knows himself cannot beinjured by praise. When a religious man was praised, he said 0 God, this servant of yours has come to me with your hatred. I cite you as a witness over his hatred. Another religious man was praised and he said i 0 God, three people do not know me. Once Hazrat Ali was praised and he said: 0 God, forgive me for what they say. Make me better than what they think about me, Once man praised Hazrat Omar who said : You areruining me. (19) Carelessness, Another harm of tongue is carelessness or inattention in words, specially when they are uttered in connection with religious affairs. The Prophet said : Let none among you say-what God wishes, and what you wish, rather say-what God wishes and then what you wish. Hazrat Ibn Abbas said : One man came to to the Prophet and said in the midst of his talk-what God wishes and you wish. The Prophet said : Have you made me equal to God ? Rather say : What the Almighty God wishes. The Prophet said : God has prohibited you to take oath by the name of your father. let him take oath in the name of God, or else let him remain silent. Hazrat Omar said Leave them, I did not take oath. The Prophet said : Let nobody among you say : My servant, my maid-servant, as you are all the servants of God and all your women are the maidservants of God. Rather says : My-boy, my girl, my son, my daughter. The servants and maid-servants shall not say : My Lord, rather they should say: My chief. All are the servants of God and God is your Lord. The Prophet said : Never call a great sinner-My chief, because if he becomes your chief, you will incur displeasure of your Lord. The Prophet said : He who says : I am free from Islam, he becomes as he has said. If he tells a lie, he will not be able to return to Islam safely. For this reason, the Prophet said : He who remains silent has got salvation. (20) Questions of ordinary men about God. Another evil of tongue is the questions of the ordinary men about God, His attributes, His words and His tongue. These attributes of God are of two kinds-uncreated and created. It is the duty of ordinary men to follow what is in the Quran about commands and prohibitions. To understand the Quran is difficult to many. The Prophet said : Leave to me what I left for you, because your predecessors were destroyed because of their excessive questions and owing to actue differences with their prophets. Give up what f prohibited you. Translate into action as far as you can what I ordered you to do. Hazrat Anas said : The people once asked the Prophet many questions to which he was enraged. Then he got up on the pulpit and said : You are questioning me, but dont ask except what I informed you. A man came to him and asked : Who is my father ? He said: Your father is Huzaifah. Then two young men came and asked : 0 Prophet of God, who is our father ? He said : Your father is one in whose name you are called. Another man got up and said : Shall I enter Paradise or Hell ? He said : You will enter Hell, and not in Paradise. When the people saw that the Prophet was enraged, they did not ask him further questions. Hazrat Omar then came to his side and said We are pleased with God as Lord, Islam as religion and Muhammad as a Prophet. Hazrat said. 0 Omar, sit down, may God shower blessings on you. What you have known is sufficient. The Prophet prohibited arguments and excessive questions. The Prophet said : Soon the people will put many questions, even they will ask: God created the creatures, but who created God ? When they will ask it, say : God is one, God is above wants etc. (Chapter Ikhlas). Then throw spit by your left side thrice and seek rebuge from the devil. Excessive questions were prohibited in the story of Moses and Khiza. So the questions of ordinary men about the subtle matter of religion are th great objects of danger. Their discussions about the language of the Quran is like the condition of one to whom the king wrote a letter, informing him many necessary things but instead of paying attention to, these things, he began to lose time in seeing whether the paper of the letter is new or old, for which he will surely be punished. Similarly the ordinary men give up many necessary things but question about many unnecessary and subtle things about God and His attributes.
Posted on: Sun, 04 Jan 2015 20:05:44 +0000
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