Like Masood Ahmad B.Sc., the takfiri, founder of Jamaat al-Muslimin Registered Karachi, Dr. Masood al-Din Osmani also belonged to those people who themselves go astray and lead others astray. Among Dr. Sahib’s opinions and deviations are the denial of the punishment of the grave and insults to the righteous predecessors (salaf al-salihin). He used to call Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal, the imam of Ahl al-Sunnah wal-Jama’ah, (may Allah have mercy on him), a disbeliever. In this connection, Hafiz Zubair Ali Zai (may Allah preserve him) held a “debate” with him, but when Masood Sahib could not give an answer, he considered escape to be the only safety. To clarify some of the delusions and deceptions of this very “Firqah Mas’udiyyah: 2”, the respected Fazl Akbar Kashmiri has taken up the pen, which is presented for your consideration.
Love of Ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him) or Taqlid of Dr. Masood?
The demand of truth-seeking as a believer and Muslim is that a person should study the Qur’an and Sunnah with an empty mind, without first forming any opinion, and then, in the light of the evidences of the Qur’an and Hadith, submit to whatever truth becomes clear. But it has been the method of misguided sects that first they establish self-made principles and form a self-made opinion. Then they look for evidences in favour of it from the Book and the Sunnah. Then whatever evidences do not fit their established principles are rejected. And they do not refrain from relying on weak narrations in support of their false opinion.
One of these misguided sects is the one of Dr. Masood al-Din Osmani, the author of “Kaifiyat Azab-e-Qabr”. He did the same thing: he tried to make authentic hadiths appear weak and weak ones appear authentic. He made far-fetched interpretations of authentic hadiths. He presented weak narrations in support of his opinion. By making arbitrary interpretations of Qur’anic verses, he mocked the hadiths. One of his sub-sects (al-Muslimin) denied the descent of Isa, the Dajjal, the Imam Mahdi, the effect of magic, the evil eye, the sending of reward (isal-e-thawab), the punishment of the grave, and so on. And the process of division within them continues. On the other hand, our methodology is completely clear, namely: deriving evidence from authentic and good narrations and complete avoidance of weak and rejected narrations.
One of the important beliefs of Islam is the belief in the punishment of the grave. This belief is established with certainty from authentic and mutawatir hadiths. This sect of Masoodiyyah made an unlawful and crude interpretation of the authentic, clear and mutawatir hadiths about the punishment of the grave and presented a new opinion. Similarly, the affirmation of the descent of Masih (peace be upon him) is established from Qur’anic verses, authentic and mutawatir hadiths, and the consensus of the Muslims. These hadiths too were sacrificed to corrupt and false interpretations. Likewise, their attitude toward the hadiths of Sahihayn concerning magic is the same.
These gentlemen also consider taking a stipend for religious acts (taat) to be unlawful, and they propagate that it is not permissible to pray behind scholars who take stipends. In this regard, the authentic hadiths present in Sahih al-Bukhari, Sahih Muslim and other hadith books, from which the permissibility of payment is established, they interpret in false ways that depart from the principles of the muhaddithin, and they rely on weak narrations for the impermissibility.
An example of mocking hadith
It comes in a hadith of Muslim: “Whoever memorises the first ten (10) verses of Surah al-Kahf will be protected from the trial of the Dajjal.”
“For God’s sake, take the Quran and read the first 10 verses of Surah al-Kahf, and see which thing in them helps in protection from the Dajjal.”
Just as these people are caught in excess and deficiency in beliefs, their conduct in practice is the same: they call authentic hadiths weak and weak hadiths authentic. Only two (2) examples are presented to the readers.
In their magazine “Habl Allah”, Sa’id Ahmad wrote an article on the biography of Sayyiduna Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him), in which he made considerable mockery and censure of Ahl al-Hadith. At one place, the gentleman writes:
“The matter worthy of consideration is that the muhaddithin and experts in narrator criticism confine jarh wa ta’dil to the Tabi’in alone, whereas this sectarian group, afflicted with blind imitation and mind-worship, crosses all moral limits and does not refrain from disparaging a great Companion and besmirching a supremely eminent jurist. Partisan bigotry has made them completely blind…. Although these accusations are the unserious manifestations of sectarian malice and are not worthy of scholarly discussion, still, to prevent deception and the satanic campaign to shake people’s trust in the Companions of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, it must be stopped.”
Further on, the gentleman writes:
“There are also numerous narrations in support of not raising the hands, among which the following narration of Jami’ al-Tirmidhi is very clear and explicit.”
Similarly, this sect has a pocket-size booklet “al-Salah”, in which this weak narration is also cited. Yet in its preface, the following weighty words are used about this pocket-size booklet:
“Therefore, those who accepted the call to pure faith and support this mission have long felt a dire need for such a book as al-Salah.”
A brief investigation of the hadith of Ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him)
عن علقمة قال قال عبدالله بن مسعود: ألا أصلي بكم صلوة رسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم فصلي فلم يرفع يديه إلا فى أول مرة
“Alqamah (may Allah have mercy on him) says that (Sayyiduna) Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him) said: Shall I not pray for you the prayer of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ? So he prayed and did not raise his hands except the first time.”
Answer:
Imam al-Tirmidhi (may Allah have mercy on him) graded this hadith as hasan, but the majority of muhaddithin have declared this hadith of Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him) weak and unestablished.
Imam al-Tirmidhi (may Allah have mercy on him) quoted the statement of Imam Abdullah ibn al-Mubarak (may Allah have mercy on him) regarding this hadith:
قد ثبت حديث من يرفع و ذكر حديث الزهري عن سالم عن أبيه ولم يثبت حديث ابن مسعود إن النبى لم يرفع يديه إلا فى أول مرة
“Indeed the hadith of raising the hands is established, and he mentioned the hadith of Abdullah ibn Umar (may Allah be pleased with him), and the hadith of Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him) is not established, in which it is stated that the Prophet ﷺ did not raise his hands except the first time.”
Some people have tried to remove Abdullah ibn al-Mubarak’s criticism from this hadith of Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him), but the following muhaddithin have held that this criticism relates to this very narration: for example, Hafiz
and others.
Besides this, Imam al-Shafi’i (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam Abu Hatim al-Razi (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam al-Daraqutni (may Allah have mercy on him), Hafiz Ibn Hibban (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam Abu Dawud (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam al-Bukhari (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam Yahya ibn Adam (may Allah have mercy on him), Ibn al-Qattan al-Fasi (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam al-Hakim (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam Muhammad ibn Nasr al-Marwazi (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam al-Bayhaqi (may Allah have mercy on him) and others have all severely criticised this hadith. See:
and others.
The second defect in this narration is that Imam Sufyan al-Thawri (may Allah have mercy on him) narrated it with ‘an’an (mu’an’an). Although Imam Sufyan al-Thawri (may Allah have mercy on him) is a trustworthy, firm and great muhaddith, he was also a mudallis, and used to practise tadlis even from weak narrators.
And a mudallis’s narration is weak unless he explicitly states hearing (sama’) in his narration.
And in no chain of this narration is there any explicit statement of hearing anywhere.
The preserved narration of Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him)
Scholars of hadith have strongly criticised the narration of Sufyan al-Thawri, whereas the preserved and original narration of Sayyiduna Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him) is the one related through the chain of Imam Abdullah ibn Idris (may Allah have mercy on him).
See:
From this it becomes known that Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him) used to perform raf’ al-yadayn in the prayer. Bukhari said: “According to the research scholars, this narration is the preserved one among the hadiths of Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him).”
Ibn Khuzaymah (196), Daraqutni (1/339) and Ibn al-Jarud (196) have declared this narration sahih.
In Sahih Muslim (534) there is also a supporting narration (shahid) for it.
By presenting the weak narration about abandoning raf’ al-yadayn, the author has tried to throw mud at the Ahl al-Hadith. The crime of the Ahl al-Hadith is that they call that weak narration weak. Now let us see whether Sa’id Ahmad, who wrote a twelve-page article giving a false impression about Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him), and his Barzakhi group, act upon the above-mentioned narration of Abdullah ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him) or not. Hafiz Zubair Ali Zai (may Allah preserve him) has conducted a scholarly discussion on this narration.
See:
The Hafiz has, with several proofs, established that the hadith al-Thawri with its chain from Ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him) is weak and rejected, and has written that:
“This hadith is defective (ma’lul) with a harmful defect (illah qadihah), and it is weak both in its chain and in its text.”
Although Imam Tirmidhi (may Allah have mercy on him), Imam Ibn Hazm (may Allah have mercy on him), Allamah al-Albani (may Allah have mercy on him) and Allamah Ahmad Shakir (may Allah have mercy on him) have authenticated or graded it as hasan, more than twenty hadith imams have declared this narration weak, and their research is the preponderant (rajih) view.
Second example
In another issue of “Hablullah”, he calls “Salat al-Tasbih” a marvel, writing:
“… This narration appears to be a marvel: from the permission to perform it every day up to performing it only once in one’s lifetime, and by performing Salat al-Tasbih just once in one’s lifetime all of one’s sins of the past and future, whether major or minor, intentional or unintentional, etc., are forgiven!”
Research on the hadith of Salat al-Tasbih
This hadith (Abu Dawud, Abwab al-Tatawwu’, Bab Salat al-Tasbih, hadith 1297) and Ibn Majah (Iqamat al-Salat, Bab ma ja’a fi Salat al-Tasbih, hadith 1386) contain it.
Imam Ibn Khuzaymah (hadith 1216) and al-Hakim (1/318) have called it sahih.
Hafiz Ibn Hajar (may Allah have mercy on him) says that this hadith is hasan due to the multiplicity of its routes (kathrat turuq).
Shaykh al-Albani (may Allah have mercy on him) says that Imam al-Hakim and Hafiz al-Dhahabi have pointed to its strengthening, and this is correct, because it has many routes.
Allamah Mubarakpuri and Shaykh Ahmad Shakir have also called it sahih hasan.
Whereas Khatib al-Baghdadi, Imam al-Nawawi and Ibn al-Salah have called it sahih.
Abu Bakr al-Ajurri (in al-Targhib wal-Tarhib, 1/468), Abu al-Hasan al-Maqdisi and Abu Dawud, among others, have called it sahih. For details, see the book “Nayl al-Maqsud fi al-Ta’liq ‘ala Sunan Abi Dawud” by Hafiz Zubair Ali Zai.
One of the narrators of this hadith (Musa ibn Abd al-Aziz) has been described as unknown (majhul) by the author of the article. However, a group of narrators have related hadith from Musa ibn Abd al-Aziz. Ibn Ma’in, al-Nasa’i, Abu Dawud, Ibn Shahin and others, the majority, have declared him trustworthy (thiqah).
Only the criticism of Ibn al-Madini and al-Sulaymani is found, which, being against the majority, is rejected.
Therefore Musa ibn Abd al-Aziz is “hasan al-hadith”. Two other hadiths concerning Salat al-Tasbih are also acceptable as evidence:
➊ The hadith of Jabir ibn Abdullah al-Ansari (may Allah be pleased with him)
➋ The hadith of Abdullah ibn Amr ibn al-As (may Allah be pleased with him).
See:
For detailed discussion, see “al-Tarshih li-Bayan Salat al-Tasbih” with takhrij and books on the narrators (kutub al-rijal).
(In extreme brevity, an attempt has been made to clarify some of the deceptions of “Firqah Mas’udiyyah: 1” which these people present in defence of their self-invented theory.)
