When does Istighaatha fall under Kufr or Shirk?

brother, can you please delete the posts by @MuhammedAli on this thread ... they will cause confusion and spread misguidance to the uninformed, simply because of the atrocious english coupled with a mishmash of bad reasoning and inadequate aqidah points, plus they will give a field day to wahabis and devbandis to attack Sunnis and the forum.

 

brother, you need to read again.
one can quote scores of aayat from the qur'an that say: 'worship' of anyone/anything other than Allah ta'ala is shirk.
it seems that you have missed a step somewhere - you need to slowly retrace.

ibadah of ghayrullah is shirk.

that is the fundamental principle. start from there.

 

.

 

asking an idol would be shirk even with the above riders. apart from being exceedingly stupid for doing so. simply because an idol is a stone - unlike awliya and anbiya who were humans and it is a fact that Allah ta'ala had given them the powers of speech and discerning, will and ability [albeit limited] to act according their wills. and anbiya awliya were pious worshippers of Allah, believed in tawHid.

now, the difference of opinion between us and the wahabis or rejectors of istighatha is that these faculties are absent after they pass away from the dunya. we say, these faculties remain even after they leave this world.

as for the idol - it is a stone. only an idol worshipper would even think of asking it.

you say: "it will give only with the Will of Allah.."

but this is a fallacy of false equivalence. the qur'an explicitly tells us that idols are lifeless and absolutely powerless. you cannot simply "assume" that they can help. it is by nass. you cannot come up with a hypothetical "what if..."

the answer is: 'it is emphatically NOT'.

the same applies for fussaq, kuffar even though they are humans. or animals such as a cow or a snake (hindus worship cows, monkeys and snakes) because Allah ta'ala will not allow His Grace to appear or emanate in filthy places or places that earn the Displeasure of Allah.

we pray numerous time every day:

غير المغضوب عليهم





====
wahabis apply all the verses that mention: "tad'una" / 'call upon' - to term those who believe in istimdad as shirk.
becasue they take "calling upon" literally; whereas in the qur'an it is used to mean: 'worship' or 'call upon them as independent of Allah'.

---
so if you want to make up hypotheses without any sense and ask questions on based on absurd premises, there is no limit to the 'what if'.

is it permissible to do wudu or tayammum with fire if it flows like water and does not burn you and two drops of fire flow on the entire organ?

 

1)

1) https://www.islamimehfil.com/topic/...ne-which-non-islamic-ritual-acts-are-worship/
2) https://www.islamimehfil.com/topic/...ition-of-worship-for-islamic-acts-of-worship/

This is extra:

https://www.islamimehfil.com/topic/...-worship-without-any-one-there-is-no-worship/

 

I advise anyone who can read Urdu to read, Gulshan e Tawheed Wa Risalat, Volume Two, Pages 106 onwards.

https://www.scribd.com/document/104...-Muhammad-ashraf-syalwe#fullscreen&from_embed

 

please what is the definition of ibadah?

 

I am not going to respond to everyone here. So I am sorry for putting you in the corssair.

So what lead him to worship? Ilahiyyah or Ibadah? What came FIRST? CREED THAT X DESERVES WORSHIP, OR DID WORSHIP LEAD YOU TO BELIEVE Allah is my Ilah? IF creed X is my Ilah came before IBADAH than how and why are you determining Tawheed/Shirk of x, y, z, on basis of Ibadah? What if someone affirms Ilahiyyah but does not actually WORSHIP AN IDOL? IS HE NOW MUSLIM AND MUWAHID? To determine Tawheed/Shirk on basis of Ibadah is utterly sensless.

 

salam hazrat. can you please answer this as well:
I am talking about a hypothetical scenario, where someone asks an idol believing the idol to be a creation of Allah and says "this idol is only a creation, it doesn't have intrinsic capabilities, it will give but only with the will of Allah, it is not qadeem or wajib ul wujud, it is contingent, it is not God. It is not worthy of worship as well. I am not worshiping it but rather only asking it for help and it will help with the will of Allah." and then asks it for help, would this be shirk al akbar or not?
Again, in case anyone has doubts about me, I am a barelvi AlHumdulillaah. I consider istighatha to be jaiz. I just want to know about the above question because what I had been told was that the above is shirk al akbar, but in this thread, I heard a new opinion.

 

Without getting into arguments,
it seems there are scholars on both sides,

Scholars who approve of Istighatha like Shihab uddin Ramli and Khair uddin Ramli
https://thequranblog.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/istighatha-shamsuddinramli.pdf

The Imām was asked: Regarding what occurs amongst the awwām who when in distress say “ya shaykh fulān” and “ya Rasūlullāh” and things like this from seeking aid (istighātha) with the Prophets and the Awliyā, the ‘Ulemā and the righteous, is this permitted or not? And do the Messengers, Prophets, Awliyā, the righteous, and the Mashayekh possess the ability to assist others after their deaths, and what strengthens that view? He replied: Istighātha (seeking aid) with the Prophets and Messengers, the Awliyā, the ‘Ulemā and the righteous is permitted. The messengers, Prophets and the Awliyā have [the ability to] assist after their death because the miracles of the Prophets and Awliyā are not severed following their death. As for the Prophets, then they are alive in their graves praying and doing hajj as it has come in the reports. So assistance from them will be a miracle on their behalf; and the martyrs are also alive, and have been seen, openly killing the kuffār. And as for the Awliyā, then it is a karama from them. The people of the truth believe that this occurs from the Awliyā both with intention, and without intention-things that sever the customary manner of phenomenal reality (khariqa lil ādah), that Allah the Exalted brings forth through them. The proof for these things is that they are matters that are (intellectually) possible and the permissibility of their occurrence does not necessitate anything that is impossible. So everything that is in this realm, then it is possible to occur. (An example) of its occurrence is the story of Maryam and how the provision came to her from Allah - as stated in the revelation, and the story of Abū Bakr and his guests as appears in the sahīh, and the gushing (flowing forth) of the Nile river due to the letter of ‘Umar, and him seeing, while on the minbar in Medina, the army (being approached for a sneak attack), till he said to the Amīr of the army: “O Sariya, the mountain!”, warning him of the enemy behind the mountain. And Sariya heard his speech even though there was a great distance between them - the distance of two months journey. Khalīd Ibn Walīd drank poison without it harming him. Khawāriq (matters that customarily go against the rules of phenomenal reality) have occurred by the hands of the companions, the followers, and those after them. It is not possible to deny this due to the fact that taken as a whole; they are at the level of tawātur. So, in general, what is possible to be a miracle (mu’jiza) for a Prophet, is possible to be a karama for a Walī. There is no distinction between them except in the area of provocation

https://wahhabisrefuted.wordpress.c...dict-on-saying-ya-abd-al-qadir-shayun-lillah/

He was Khayr al-Din ibn Ahmad ibn Nur al-Din `Ali ibn Zayn al-Din al-Faruqi al-Ramli al-Hanafi (1585-1671), possibly the greatest of the Hanafi authorities in his time. Imam Haskafi, the author of the Durr al-Mukhtar and student of Imam Khayr al-Din, described him as:

شَيْخِي الْحَبْرُ السَّامِي وَالْبَحْرُ الطَّامِي . وَاحِدُ زَمَانِهِ وَحَسَنَةُ أَوَانِهِ . شَيْخُ الْإِسْلَامِ الشَّيْخُ خَيْرُ الدِّينِ الرَّمْلِيُّ أَطَالَ اللَّهُ بَقَاءَهُ

“My shaykh, the sublime scholar, the satiated ocean, the rarest of his age, and most excellent of his time, the Shaykh al-Islam Khayr al-Din al-Ramli.”

Ibn `Abidin, who quotes Ramli extensively in his commentary, stated:

الْإِمَامُ الْمُفَسِّرُ الْمُحَدِّثُ الْفَقِيهُ اللُّغَوِيُّ الصُّوفِيُّ النَّحْوِيُّ الْبَيَانِيُّ الْعَرُوضِيُّ الْمَنْطِقِيُّ الْمُعَمِّرُ . شَيْخُ الْحَنَفِيَّةِ فِي عَصْرِهِ وَصَاحِبُ الْفَتَاوَى السَّائِرَةِ وَغَيْرِهَا مِنْ التَّآلِيفِ النَّافِعَةِ فِي الْفِقْهِ

“The Imam, Qur’anic exegete, hadith scholar, scholar of law, linguist, Sufi, grammarian… the shaykh of the Hanafis of his age…”

In his work on legal verdicts, entitled Fatawa Khayiryyah (vol 2, pg: 182 Dar al-Ma`rifah ed. 1974), the Imam was asked about those who “state ‘Oh Shaykh `Abd al-Qadir! Oh Ahmad! Oh Rifa`i! Give us something for the sake of Allah!’” The Imam answered, after a lengthy verdict on loud dhikr,:

“As for their saying ‘Oh `Abd al-Qadir’ then it is [merely] a call (nida’).

When ‘give us something for Allah’ is conjoined to it then it is seeking something out of the bountifulness (ikraman) of Allah. So what necessitates its impermissibility (hurmatihi)?

[…]

[And the statement] some have passed the verdict of disbelief upon the one who said ‘give us something for Allah’ then there is no reason (wajh) for it. How can this be when they state that a believer does not leave faith except through the denial (juhud) of that which he entered it through? And their saying [it is] disbelief is a grave matter (`azim) for the verdict of disbelief is not passed against a Muslim on that which there is disagreement upon, even [if the difference is established] by a weak narration (bi riwayat dh`aifah). And we seek refuge in Allah that disbelief be found in this.”


See this one also: https://ahlus-sunnah.com/en/articledetail/134
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Then you have the other scholars who have rejected this like Abdul Hayy Lacknawi, Shah Wali ullah Dahlawi and hanbalis and others who the deobandis salafis love to quote

https://www.ilmgate.org/the-ruling-on-istighathah/
10) Mawlana ‘Abd al-Hayy al-Laknawi (d. 1304 H) wrote regarding the statement, “O Shaykh ‘Abd al-Qadir! [Give me] something for the sake of Allah”:

“Second, such recitation consists of calling on the dead from a distance and it is not established in the Shari‘ah that saints have the power to listen to a call from a distance. However, it is established that the dead hear the salutation of the visitors to their graves. But to believe that anyone beside Allah (Glorified is He) is present and seeing and aware of the hidden and evident at all times is shirk. In Fatawa Bazaziyyah it is written that if one marries without witnesses and says that I make Allah, His Messenger and the angels witnesses, ‘he has disbelieved because he believed that the Messenger and the angel know the unseen, and our ‘ulama’ have said that whoever says that the souls of the saints are present and knowing has disbelieved.’ Although Hazrat Shaykh ‘Abd al-Qadir is one of the great saints of the Muhammadan nation and his merits and virtues are innumerable, but it is not established that he hears the distressed caller from a distance. And the beliefs that he is aware of his disciple’s affairs all the time, and hears their calls, are beliefs of shirk. And Allah knows best.” (Mujmu’ah al-Fatawa, 4:331; extracted from Maqalat Usmani, 2:307)

see more quotes

Hanbali scholars
https://thethinkingmuslim.com/2020/...ali-school-a-discussion-with-sh-kareem-helmy/

More quotes
https://www.basair.net/istigatha/
https://barelwism.wordpress.com/category/istighathah

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Bottom line and Conclusion: Those who rejected Isthighatha are fuqaha or mutakallim, they really don't understand or able to make the distinction of several sufi concepts, exactly like the ones who attacked Shaykh al-Akbar Ibn Arabi. Can you show me fatwa from Sufi Fuqaha, like Suyuti Ibn Ajiba Abdul Ghani Nabulsi Ahmad Zarruq etc.. who rejected isthighatha then we can have further discussion

 

If a person performs an act of worship toward an idol while intending worship in his heart, then he is committing shirk — even if he does not believe the idol has divine attributes or divinity. This is because he has treated the object as worthy of worship, and only Allah is worthy of worship. By doing so, he has partnered that object with Allah in worship, and this is shirk, and therefore kufr. Shirk is not only in belief about divine attributes — it can also occur through worship itself, because worshiping anything besides Allah is to share Allah’s exclusive right.

 

exactly brother then that isn't ibadah/worship then is it?
just the actions of worship are not worship. When those actions are performed whilst consider someone a god then they become worship. With all due respect, I think you might have misunderstood the definition of what worship/ibadah is.
I think that before delving into such deep and (i think deep is an understatement here), I think we should all work on the basics first. I am talking about myself before anyone else.
Apologies if i came across as rude in any way.

 

Do you divide Tawhid into
- Uluhiyyah
- Ruboobiyyah
- Asmaa was sifaat
?

 

Shirk in Ilahiyyah is to believe there is another Ilah, another Mabud, another being deserving of worship instead of or as well as Allah n not actions of Ibadah.

 

with all due respect. Aside from my previous questions, I would like to ask brother MuhammadAli a few more questions please.

1) Please can you provide evidence that "ibadah comes after affirmation"? Even just one reference for this statement from the 1400 years of Islamic scholarship please. The meaning of ibadah is to "submit WHILST believe someone to be a god". Doesn't this mean that ibadah isn't just the actions of bowing or ruku and qiyam - it is, in reality, the simultaneously taking place of the ACTION and THE BELIEF. So your following statement requires proof please.

2) With all due respect brother, could it be that you are perhaps misunderstanding the definition of ibadah and what worship is. Because it is seeming as if you consider ibadah to be JUST THE PHYSICAL ACTIONS and NOT THE BELIEF whereas in reality, isn't ibadah IS about the belief as well (though there is a question about that below)?
Please correct me if I am wrong.
3) Also (and I would really like mawlana abu hasan to expand on this please), could it be that maybe the word "ibadah" is the action of "considering someone to be ma'bud"? What I mean is that would just the affirmation of someone being worthy of worship count as ibadah or would physical actions have to follow up in order to fit the definition of ibadah. I am not denying that ibadah to another is shirk. This question is very particularly about the definition of ibadah. Or would affirming in heart count as an action?

 

Salam alaykum.

How is Ibadah Shirk when Shirk is associating partner with Allah in His Sifaat n Zaat?

Ilah as you said it means, something that is believed as worthy or deserving of worship. How are you defining Ilah as Ibadah? Clearly it affirming ilahiyyah is issue of purely creedal matter n not of Ibadah.

Ibadah is after affirmation of ilahiyyah. Ibadah is not warranted upon merely affirming ilahiyyah which would be the case if what you wrote is correct.

I believe Jesus is my Ilah that does not warrant Ibadah until i engage in Ibadah. 'Shirk OF Ibadah' would only be warranted IF i engaged in Ibadah shouldn't it? Allah is my Ilah, o i have performed all my FIVE Salahs by just affirming that.

You're an Aalim and you out of all should know ibadah is not warranted on affirmation of Ilahiyyah. I am shocked you're writing this.

 

this is incorrect. i urge brothers to learn the basic definitions

the literal meaning of ilaah is: 'worthy of being worshipped'. that is ma'abud.
thus ibadah of ANYTHING or ANYONE other than Allah sub'hanahu wa ta'ala is shirk or polytheism.

secondly,
there are certain attributes that belong only to Allah ta'ala. if anyone believes that attributes unique to Allah ta'ala are present in anyone else, it is also shirk.

when wahabis and their followers accuse muslims of shirk, they base their rulings on the second definition.

for example, 'tasarruf' or 'ilm ghayb' i.e. in their mind these are absolutely the attributes of Allah ta'ala and thus anyone attributing to idols or even anbiya or awliya is guilty of shirk.

our difference with them is - and hence the arguments/disagreement: while the absolute and true giver of everything is Allah ta'ala, He has ordained means and appointed agents to do certain things - thus our attribution is in the metaphorical or relative sense or as an idiom; certainly we do not mean the absolute.

for example, hazrat jibreel would say: "i will grant you (ahaba) a son." this is majaz. absolutely it is Allah who gives son, creates everything - but here as jibreel alayhis salam was the means - sabab - the act was attributed to him.

similarly a doctor 'heals' 'cures' 'shifa is in his hand' - does not mean that the doctor has absolute control or power. he is means of delivering the cure - and teh cure is absolutely given by Allah ta'ala.

so also every small or big thing that we ask help for - we ask friends for financial help, to help doing tasks or whatever. we do not intend that they are absolute helpers alongside Allah ta'ala - al iyadhu billah.

----
in all cases, help that is sought is with the belief that - they can help ONLY with Allah's leave.

thus, if a person goes to a doctor renowned for his craft, but fails in the operation - it is because Allah ta'ala did not allow this. He Willed otherwise.

similarly, if you ask awliya anbiya and some thing does not happen - it is because Allah ta'ala does not allow it. NO ONE is out of Allah's Power and nothing can happen without His Will.


وَمَا تَشَاءُونَ إِلا أَنْ يَشَاءَ اللَّهُ رَبُّ الْعَالَمِينَ

----
so tawHeed means that Allah sub'hanahu wa ta'ala is absolutely independent, absolute in His Will, absolutely alone in Essence and absolutely has no partner in His Attributes.

----
certain attributes that are "shared" are only in the names or the words that describe them.

raheem, kareem, samiy, baSir, muntaqim, kabeer, malik (king), mu'min (believer), shakur, aleem, Hakam, Hafeez, Haleem, Hakeem, wadud, shaheed, wakeel, waHid, awwal, aakhir, ghaniyy, warith, rashid... etc

are just due to constraints of language and human understanding - homonyms. they are not 'shared' attributes - al iyadhu billah.

similarly, ilm al-ghayb - dhati (His own), kull (complete), all-encompassing, etc belongs only to Allah.
anbiya awliya are "GIVEN" ilm - so in their case it is 'atayi, haadith (accident), ba'ad (small portion) etc.

thus the claim that we believe that awliya or anbiya have the 'same attributes' of Allah, is a false claim and hence the ruling of shirk does not apply.


Allah ta'ala knows best.

 

also, with the points you brought up, I would like to ask you
1) what is the definition of ibadah?
2) is ibadah just the name of actions or does it include the BELIEF IN A GOD as well?
3) if you are saying that it is just the actions then that is not ibadah, by definition. And if you are saying that it includes the part about BELIEF IN A GOD as well, then there are following questions:
i) if you make the argument that "is ibadah associating with the dhaat or sifat", then I would like to that what is it that makes you say that "the belief in another god is shirk"? What is the definition of iman of a mukallaf? Is iman (belief) of a mukallaf created? If you say this, then clearly this is kufr. If you say that "iman of Allah is qadeem" well then my question is that are you associating (with Allah) a partner in his dhaat or attribute when affirming another God, since "Allah's iman" would only come into the conversation of shirk fil sifat.
ii) if we go this route then, one can make an argument that "the belief" itself in another God isn't shirk, but rather "what it entails". I mean, with all due respect. this is going around in circles and what does all this actually entail?
iii) if we say that " doing ibadah to other than Allah is not shirk but rather the affirmation" then a followup question would be the following: if a person believes an idol to be god but contingent, then he is a mushrik. Now if he goes ahead and believes that the idol is also qadeem, does he commit shirk again or not? If he then then affirms unlimited power, hearing and sight for it then does the person commit shirk AGAIN, or not? So, if we accept the point that " he is only affirming shirk when worshiping other than Allah but worship to other than Allah in and of itself is not shirk" well then how can we call the previous example shirk since person was already a mushrik. If you say that but "affirming qidm etc" to someone else is shirk in and of itself. Well then this is the precise point with ibadah. Which is submission whilst affirming Godhood for another.

Again, all these are questions and not answers. even though they might give a different impression due to the tone. And the "you" here was not meant for brother MuhammadAli after the first sentence but rather a general "you".
Apologies, Mawlana Abu Hasan. I know you don't like me ask hair splitting questions. I promise I would not have gone down this route, had it not been for the coversation which had already took place within the thread. Please accept the apology.

 

sorry this was meant to be for the point brother MuhammadAli is making (of ibadah to other than Allah in and of itself not being shirk). Not the question which i asked earlier in that post.
With all due respect hazrat, some of the later questions posted in this thread are different, such as "is it shirk to ask a statue for help without consider it to be mustaqil bil dhaat or a god" and that "can a kafir or murtad be considered a muwwahhid despite his kufr, due to believing in Allah". If you don't mind, do you perhaps know about any threads which answer this (and have been answered by mawlana abu hasan or one of the admis)?

 

Similar thread which was locked
Answers many of your questions

Looks like this subject never gets closed.

https://sunniport.com/index.php?threads/shaykh-asrar-on-istighathah.15577/