Abdullah bin Amr (may Allah be pleased with them both) said: I heard the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) saying: "Allah does not take away knowledge (by snatching it), rather He takes away the scholars. When no scholar remains, people will take ignorant people as their leaders; they will give fatwas without knowledge, so they will go astray themselves and lead others astray."
Hadith Referenceالسنن الكبرى للبيهقي / كتاب آداب القاضي / 20352
Sayyiduna Abu Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him) said: The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Whoever attributes to me what I did not say, let him take a house in Hell. Whoever gives a fatwa without knowledge, its sin is upon him. And whoever gives his brother wrong advice, while knowing that the right course is something else, has betrayed him."
Hadith Referenceالسنن الكبرى للبيهقي / كتاب آداب القاضي / 20353
Abu Hashim said: Were it not for a hadith that Ibn Buraydah narrated to me from his father (Sayyiduna Buraydah (may Allah be pleased with him)), that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Judges are of three kinds: two are in Hell and one is in Paradise: (1) one who recognises the truth and judges by it; he is in Paradise. (2) One who judges between people in ignorance; he is in Hell. (3) One who recognises the truth and acts unjustly; he too is in Hell," we would have said: When a judge exercises his own judgement, there is no blame on him.
The Shaykh said: Exercising judgement without knowledge does not lead to the truth except by chance, so he is not permitted to do it.
Hadith Referenceالسنن الكبرى للبيهقي / كتاب آداب القاضي / 20354
Ibn Buraydah narrates from his father (Sayyiduna Buraydah (may Allah be pleased with him)) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Judges are of three kinds: two judges will go to Hell and one to Paradise: 1. one who knowingly judges unjustly is in Hell; 2. one who judges wrongly out of ignorance and does not fulfil people's rights is also in Hell; 3. one who judges correctly is in Paradise."
Hadith Referenceالسنن الكبرى للبيهقي / كتاب آداب القاضي / 20355
Abu al-Aliyah (may Allah have mercy on him) narrates from Sayyiduna Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) that he said: "Judges are of three kinds; two kinds will go to Hell and one judge will go to Paradise: (1) one who deliberately turns away from the truth, and (2) one who errs in his ijtihad; both of these are in Hell. (3) One who strives in ijtihad for the truth and gets it right is in Paradise." The narrator said: I said to Abu al-Aliyah (may Allah have mercy on him): What is the fault of one who strives for the truth but errs? He said: If he wished, he would not sit to judge, since he is not able to judge well.
The Shaykh said: Abu al-Aliyah's (may Allah have mercy on him) explanation requires that one who is not among the people of ijtihad and yet attempts ijtihad (will be held to account); but one who is among the people of ijtihad and then errs will be forgiven, by the ruling of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), as is reported in the hadiths of Sayyiduna Amr bin al-As and Sayyiduna Abu Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with them both).
Hadith Referenceالسنن الكبرى للبيهقي / كتاب آداب القاضي / 20357
Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri (may Allah have mercy on him) said: Sayyiduna Umar bin al-Khattab (may Allah be pleased with him) said while on the pulpit: O people, correct opinion was only that of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), because it was from Allah, the Lord of Might; from us it is only conjecture and affectation.
The Shaykh said: By this he meant, and Allah knows best, opinion that does not resemble a source (asl); and what is narrated from him and others in condemnation of opinion carries this meaning, for it has been narrated to us that most of them exercised ijtihad by opinion where there is no text. And Allah knows best.
Hadith Referenceالسنن الكبرى للبيهقي / كتاب آداب القاضي / 20358
Abd al-Rahman bin Ghanm narrates from Sayyiduna Umar bin al-Khattab (may Allah be pleased with him) that he said: Woe to the judges of the earth from the One who is in the heavens; on the Day of Resurrection, (before) the One who takes account, only those who acted justly will be safe: those who judged by the truth and did not let desire, kinship, greed or fear get in the way, and kept the Book of Allah before them like a mirror.
Hadith Referenceالسنن الكبرى للبيهقي / كتاب آداب القاضي / 20359
Abu Abd al-Rahman al-Sulami said: Sayyiduna Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) came to a judge and asked: Do you know the abrogating and the abrogated (al-nasikh wa al-mansukh)? He said: No. So he (may Allah be pleased with him) said: "You have perished, and you have caused others to perish."
Hadith Referenceالسنن الكبرى للبيهقي / كتاب آداب القاضي / 20360
Amr bin Amir (may Allah have mercy on him) said: Umar bin Abd al-Aziz (may Allah have mercy on him) said: It is not proper for a person to be a judge without five qualities; if one of them is missing, that is one defect, and if two are missing, those are two defects. (The five qualities are:) he knows about those who came before him, he consults people of sound opinion, he keeps away from greed, he shows forbearance towards the litigant, and he bears patiently with wrongdoers.
Hadith Referenceالسنن الكبرى للبيهقي / كتاب آداب القاضي / 20361