Following sunnah of prophet(saws).
Mu' meneen Brothers and Sisters,
As Salaam Aleikum wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh.
(May Allah's Peace, Mercy and Blessings be upon all of you)
One of our brothers/sisters has asked
this question:
Where do we draw line between the personal habits of
Prophet (PBUH) like eating habits (eat with right hand, start eating the food
from the plate from the portion which is near to us), sleeping (sleeping with
right side down and facing the Kaʼba), wearing
the slippers (start wearing from right foot and removing from left foot),
cutting nails (in the order shown by him), etc. and the other general ones
which he expected and instructed his Ummah to follow?
Whether it is Sunnah to follow
these personal habits of Prophet (PBUH) and will we get rewards for following
these habits?
Can you please reply to this question with references from
Ahadeeth?
Jazakumullahu Khair.
(There may be some grammatical and spelling
errors in the above statement. The forum does not change anything from
questions, comments and statements received from our readers for circulation in
confidentiality.)
Answer:
Following sunnah of
prophet(saws)
In the name of Allah, We praise Him, seek His
help and ask for His forgiveness. Whoever Allah guides none can misguide,
and whoever He allows to fall astray, none can guide them aright. We bear
witness that there is none worthy of worship but Allah Alone, and we bear
witness that Muhammad (saws) is His slave-servant and the seal of His
Messengers.
When one loves, admires, and idolizes someone
passionately, it is only natural that one would try and emulate every aspect of
their ‘idol’ …… the cricketers have their Sachin Tendulkars and their Brian
Laras, the golfers have their Tiger Woods, the Tennis players have their
McEnroe’s and their Federers, Hollywood have their Brad Pitts and Richard
Geres, Bollywood have their Shah Rukh Khan and Amitabh Bachan, the statesmen
have their Nelson Mandela, the businessmen have their Bill Gates, etc…..people
who love their ‘stars’ passionately, strive their absolute utmost to learn the
likes and dislikes of their ‘stars’, read and watch anything and everything
written or documented about them, and emulate their ‘style’ in everything that
they do!
Ask any aspiring cricketer and he would talk of emulating
a Tendulkar or a Lara, not only in their respective craft and skill, but even
in their ‘style’ of clothing, hair-do, habits, etc….Same with an aspiring
golfer and Tiger Woods….Same with an aspiring Hollywood actor and Brad Pitt….Same
with an aspiring Bollywood actor and Shah Rukh Khan!
The believers who sincerely believe in Allah and the Last
Day are blessed and fortunate that their ‘idol’, or the one being they are in
fact commanded to emulate by none other than their Lord Creator Himself, is the
noble self of the Last and Final Messenger of Allah, Mohamed ar-Rasool Allah
(saws)! Allah is our witness brother,
if there is no being in the annuls of creation who is worthy of emulation in
even the minutest details of his ‘life’ and his ‘style’, for the believers it
can be none other and none better (by billions of gazillion miles!) than the
Noble Messenger of Allah (saws)!
Allah Says in the Holy Quran Chapter 33 Surah
Ahzab verse 21:
There is indeed the best example for you
to follow in the Messenger of Allah, for every such person looks forward to Allah
and the Last Day, and remembers Allah much.
Every deed of the noble Messenger of Allah (saws) is
aligned to earn the Pleasure and Good Will of his Lord Creator….starting from
his look, to his exalted character, to his behavior and his relationship with
his fellow human beings….as a brother, a husband, a father, a friend, a
neighbor, a statesman, a leader, a general, a warrior in the Cause of
Allah……and above all, his untiring, unimaginable, unattainable, and without any
equal in the annuls of mankind….his unconditional love, his awe-inspiring fear,
and his sublime worship of the Lord Most Majestic, Most Supreme, Most Exalted! Every single deed, every single word, every
single act of the Messenger of Allah (saws) was aligned to earn the Pleasure
and the Good Will of his Lord Most High!
Allah is our witness brother, it would do no harm to a
believer that he emulate whatever he possibly can from the example of the Noble
Messenger (saws)…even if it be mere personal habits like eating, sleeping,
wearing of clothes or shoes, cutting of his nails, or even his example when
answering the call of nature! If one
wishes to align one’s deeds, regardless of however small or insignificant it
may seem to an onlooker, if one wishes to align one’s deeds to earn the
Pleasure and Good Will of their Lord, there would be no better example for them
to follow than the ‘life’ and ‘style’ of the Noble Messenger of Allah (saws)!
Your Question: Whether it is Sunnah
to follow these personal habits of Prophet (PBUH) and will we get rewards for
following these habits?
If one’s intention in doing any deed is to emulate the
practice or Sunnah of the Prophet (saws), without an iota of a doubt, one will
have their due reward for their obedience from their Lord.
Allah says in the Holy Quran Chapter 4 Surah Nisa verse 79-80:
We have sent you (O Mohamed) as a Messenger to
mankind, and Allah’s witness suffices for this.
Whoever obeys the Messenger, in fact obeys Allah, and
whoever turns away from him, he will be accountable for his deeds. Anyhow, we have not sent you (O Mohamed) to
be a guardian over them.
Allah says in the Holy Quran Chapter 3 Surah Ale
Imran verse 31-32:
O Prophet,
tell the people, “If you sincerely love Allah, follow me. Then Allah will love you and forgive you
your sins, for He is All Forgiving, All Merciful.” Also say to them, “Obey Allah and His
Messenger.” And if, in spite of this, they do not accept your invitation, warn them that Allah does not love
those, who refuse to obey Him and His
Messenger.
Where do we draw line between the personal habits of Prophet
(PBUH) like eating habits……………….and the other general ones which he expected
and instructed his Ummah to follow?
If the Messenger of Allah (saws) specifically commanded,
instructed, or guided the believers to follow his example when doing a
particular act, regardless of however small or insignificant it may seem, then
it would be incumbent upon the believers to obey their Prophet (saws), if
indeed they believe in Allah and the Last Day.
Sahih Muslim Hadith 5831 Narrated by Rafi' ibn Khadij; Anas ibn
Malik; Aisha.
Allah's Messenger (saws) came to
If one wishes to draw a line between which amongst the
practices or habits of the Messenger of Allah (saws) one should follow and
which one may choose to abstain, then it would be in the usage of conveniences
made available to mankind through the evolution of time and technology.
For example if one were to say that to travel by horses or
camels is a Sunnah when technology has made available to them cars and planes;
or to live in a one-storey mud-house is a Sunnah when human development has
made available strong buildings and skyscrapers; or to say that bathing or
relieving oneself in the open desert is a Sunnah when development has invented
modern bathrooms and toilets; or to say that to fight a war with swords and
spears is a Sunnah when technology have given birth to bombs and missiles; or
one insists on being treated by medieval medicine only because it is the Sunnah
when advancement in medicine has given birth to scans, and operation theatres,
and antibiotics, etc.; it is only in the
usage of these modern conveniences where one could draw a (short) line between
which amongst the practices of the Messenger of Allah (saws) one chooses to
follow or abstain.
But in all other aspects of one’s life, regarding every
act of worship, every command and guidance regarding the relationship with
one’s Creator, one’s relationship with one’s fellow man, one’s relationship
with the believers, the disbelievers, one’s wives, one’s family, one’s
companions, or one’s character, one’s behavior, one’s etiquettes, one’s
manners, etc……..basically every deed and act which remain totally unaffected
and unrelated with the modern advancement and technological improvements of
man….they would remain part of the Sunnah which the believers should strive to
follow.
Whatever written of Truth and benefit is only
due to Allah’s Assistance and Guidance, and whatever of error is of me
alone. Allah Alone Knows Best and He is
the Only Source of Strength.
Your brother and
well wisher in Islam,
Burhan
