Using stories or parables of great saints or people to explain the concepts of Deen

11 years ago By admin

Q: My question is about the validity of usage of stories or parables of great saints or people to explain the concepts of Deen to common people. I forwarded the below story to my friends and colleagues: 

A king wanted to build a great palace for which he spared no expense and so made available all his treasures. Anything that did not suit his fancy in the slightest he had torn down and built again. Finally he was convinced the palace had no shortcoming and was the greatest palace ever built.
Overflowing with pride at his beautiful palace the king announced throughout his kingdom that he would reward anyone who could point out a flaw in his new abode. All who would visit could not see any shortcoming in the beautiful building, not that anyone would even dare to point it out to their king.
People kept coming and going for the next few days until a venerable sage close to Allah happened to be passing by and stopped by when he heard the king's decree. After surveying the palace he came before the king and said, "Your Majesty, I have found two flaws in your palace." The king was taken aback because an old man apparently found what all his subjects could not, and so he asked what these flaws were. The wise man said, "Your Majesty, one flaw is that this palace will not stand forever, and will end like all things will end one day. The second is that you cannot live in this palace forever for all must die one day."

The World is a Temporary Home
No matter what high hopes a person has in this world, no matter how many beautiful houses and cars he has he will have to leave everything behind one day. The Messenger of Allah said: Be in the world as if you are a stranger
Excerpted from The Sermons by Shaykh Zulfiqar Ahmad Naqshbandi(db)

One person from the Wahabbi sect replied back asking me the following:

  1. Quran and hadith is sufficient for us we do not need such stories to understand deen.
  2. What if these stories are not authentic or are just imagination of some scholars, will we then not be sinners for propagating such false.
  3. Prophet [Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam] in his last sermon advised us to firmly hold on to Quran and Sunnah, then why do we have to propagate such stories.

My Questions:

  1. Do we need to verify the authenticity of such stories even if the message is as per the shariah?
  2. Please explain in great details for me to explain to the others.

Difference of Sunnah and tradition

11 years ago By admin

Q: During my last Jumaah at Baltimore, MD (www.isb.org) we had a brother talk during the Jumaah bayan about the difference of Sunnah and tradition and what needs to be followed etc. This has caused some confusion in my mind. I would appreciate some clarity on the issue in specific mentioned below or just in common to make me better understand what is the correct position on this.

A few things mentioned by the brother was:

  1. The Topi, Turban, Thoppe is all not Sunnah but more of custom and hence no extra reward for following the custom. For women covering their bodies is order from Allah and has to be done but for men pant/shirt is just as fine as anything else as long as it covers the aura.
  2. There are some things that the Prophet(pbuh) did that are not sunnah, for example he slept after the Tahajjud/Sunnah of Fajr and we do not need to do this as he did not ask us to do it. One more example given was that the Prophet(pbuh) would face the person in his entirety while talking to a person and this is again not something that needs to be emulated.
  3. There were a couple more examples given to clarify Sunnah vs tradition and what was exclusive to the prophet like marrying more than 4.

My understanding has always been that every act no matter how simple is an act that needs to be emulated in our daily lives including his dress, mannerisms etc. I would appreciate some clarity on the issue.

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