Mocking the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم) - Sheikh Ahsan Hanif

Khutbah al-Jumu'ah — Opening

إِنَّ الْحَمْدَ لِلَّهِ تَعَالَى نَحْمَدُهُ وَنَسْتَعِينُهُ وَنَسْتَغْفِرُهُ وَنَعُوذُ بِاللَّهِ مِنْ شُرُورِ أَنْفُسِنَا وَمِنْ سَيِّئَاتِ أَعْمَالِنَا مَنْ يَهْدِهِ اللَّهُ فَلَا مُضِلَّ لَهُ وَمَنْ يُضْلِلْ فَلَا هَادِيَ لَهُ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنْ لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ وَحْدَهُ لَا شَرِيكَ لَهُ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنَّ مُحَمَّدًا عَبْدُهُ وَرَسُولُهُ

أَمَّا بَعْدُ، فَإِنَّ أَصْدَقَ الْحَدِيثِ كِتَابُ اللَّهِ تَعَالَى وَخَيْرَ الْهَدْيِ هَدْيُ مُحَمَّدٍ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ وَشَرَّ الْأُمُورِ مُحْدَثَاتُهَا وَكُلَّ مُحْدَثَةٍ بِدْعَةٌ وَكُلَّ بِدْعَةٍ ضَلَالَةٌ وَكُلَّ ضَلَالَةٍ فِي النَّارِ

The Wisdom of Sending Human Messengers

One of the justifications that the Quraysh of Mecca used to have — one of the ways that they used to justify to themselves the rejection of Islam and the Quran and the rejection of our Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ — was that they would say to him: if truly Allah wanted to send to us someone to give us guidance, someone to show us the way, he would have sent down to us an angel. And Allah responds to this claim of theirs in the Quran: that if they were angels themselves, then Allah would have sent down to them an angel; but because they were men and humans, Allah chose humans to come to them.

They said: if only an angel were sent down along with him.

But were We to send to them an angel, then their affair would be finished and there would be no waiting for them.

And even if We were to send to them an angel, We would make him take the form and shape of a man, and We would make him dress as they dress — meaning that we as humans need someone like us so that we can take from their example. And so Allah sent to the humans messengers and prophets from amongst themselves.

Our Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ was a human, a man. He would eat and he would drink and he would sleep and he had emotions like we have emotions. And because we can connect to him in this way, we know that when we go through challenges and trials and difficulties, when we need guidance in our lives, we can go back to his example صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ. And that is one of the wisdoms in Allah choosing men as messengers and prophets rather than angels or some other form of creation.

And so therefore, when we have any issue in our religion, anything that we need guidance about, we find that guidance within the book of Allah — the Quran. And the book of Allah, the Quran, is made even more manifest, and it is explained and its details are given in even more clarity in the example and the life and the ahadith of our Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ.

The Mockery of the Quraysh — Not a New Trial

And so therefore it is amazing to think that there are Muslims around today who think that there are issues that come to us — there are new issues that come upon us or issues that we face — that we don't find their guidance within the Quran or we can't go back to that sunnah of the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ and take from that example. What happened a couple of days ago in France, what happened before that in Peshawar in Pakistan, and the justifications that those people are using — and in other than those incidents as well — people think that it's the first time that the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ is being made fun of. If that truly is the justification — is it the first time that names were called against the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ, or that he was harmed whether physically or verbally or emotionally or in any other way? Is this the first trial of this kind that has ever come across the Muslims in over 1,400 years of Islam?

But look at the example of the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ. Allah throughout the Quran mentions many incidents when the Quraysh would make fun and mockery and they would jest about the Muslims and about the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ. They would call him names and claim that he was a magician and a sorcerer. They would say that he was crazy:

They would say: "Oh you, the one who claims that revelation descends upon him — you're insane, you're crazy." They would call him a magician and a liar:

They were amazed that a man from amongst them would be chosen as a warner to them, and the disbelievers said: "Rather he is a magician and a liar." They ascribed to the Quran that the Prophet ﷺ would recite to them — they said it was lies, that he was ascribing to Allah words that he was just making up:

Over and over again in the 23 years of prophethood, the Prophet ﷺ came up against these challenges. They would make mockery of Islam and the Muslims, and Allah says:

We tested one of them against the other, and they would say: "Surely if Allah wanted to give revelation and guidance, why did he choose these people? If Allah was going to make a prophet and messenger, why did he choose him? Didn't he find anyone better in this world? If Allah was going to give guidance and choose Muslims as his companions, why did he choose these weak people — these slaves, these women, these people — why didn't he choose us, the nobility of Quraysh?"

And so these attacks would come upon the Prophet ﷺ over and over again. They would say to the Prophet ﷺ:

They said: "We will never believe in you until you make springs gush forth from the earth, or that you have gardens of date-palm trees and grapes and you make rivers gush between them, or there is for you a palace made of gold and precious stones, or you fly and ascend into the heavens — and even then we won't believe in your ascension into the heavens unless you bring down for us a physical book that we can see you bringing down." And as Allah also says, they said: "Or you make the sky fall down upon us in pieces, or you bring Allah and all of His angels and present them before us."

These were the types of accusations and claims and demands that they would make against the Prophet ﷺ — demand upon demand, claim upon claim. Why? Because they had no need, they had no intention of believing in the Prophet ﷺ. So it's not the first time, and it certainly won't be the last time.

Every Response Must Have Its Basis in Quran and Sunnah

But what we as Muslims need to know and understand is that one of the cornerstones of our religion is that every single thing that we do — especially in the name of the religion — must have a basis in the book of Allah or the authentic sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ. And that is the true meaning of the hadith of the Prophet ﷺ: "None of you truly believes until I am more beloved to him than his parents and his children and everyone else in this world." The meaning of that is that you sacrifice your desires, your emotions, your rationale and thought processes — you sacrifice all of that for that which you find in the book of Allah and the sunnah and example of our Prophet ﷺ.

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 15; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 44)

The Prophet's Response: Mercy and Patience

When these people would come and they would do this to him — and the Prophet ﷺ had many enemies during his time and many opponents who opposed him — but how did the Prophet ﷺ react towards them? How would he deal with these claims that they would make? How would he deal with their ridiculing and mockery of him? How would he deal when they would try to destroy Islam or assassinate him, or when they would come and they would harm the Prophet ﷺ and the Muslims?

Look at his example. In the hadith of Anas رضي الله عنه in Sahih Muslim, the Prophet ﷺ was once asked by his companions to make du'a against the disbelievers. They said: "O Messenger of Allah, make du'a against the disbelievers." So he said ﷺ: "I was not sent by Allah to curse the people, but I was sent by Allah as a mercy towards them." As Allah says in the Quran:

"We have only sent you as a mercy for all of the world." The great illustrious companion Abdullah ibn Abbas رضي الله عنه in his tafsir of this verse said that the Prophet ﷺ was a rahma and a mercy to the believers because through him, by the will of Allah, they had guidance; and at the same time he was a mercy to the disbelievers because of the way that he would deal with them and because of how eager he was that they would receive revelation and guidance from Allah — and the fact that during his time Allah would never send down upon them a punishment that would destroy them all. And so he was a mercy ﷺ even in the most difficult of circumstances, even in the most ardent of hardships.

The Prophet ﷺ would display mercy and he would display patience in the hopes that those people would one day say لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ. Because his mission in this dunya was not — as some people think — to conquer the world. If it was to conquer the world then Allah wouldn't have allowed him to pass away before he completed his mission. And the Prophet ﷺ wouldn't have said on the day of Hajj, when he made his farewell Hajj: قَدْ بَلَّغْتُ الرِّسَالَةَ — "I have conveyed the message" — وَأَدَّيْتُ الْأَمَانَةَ — "and fulfilled the trust that You, O Allah, placed upon my shoulders." Rather, his mission was to spread Islam, to teach people the beauty of Islam. And that's why whenever someone came to make mockery and jest of him, when someone came to harm Islam or the Muslims, the Prophet ﷺ would respond by teaching them the beauty of Islam, teaching them the real true meaning of Islam. He would win them over by his conduct and his character, his mercy and his patience — not by violence and doing even more harm to them than they did towards him.

The Day of Ta'if

Even in the most difficult of circumstances, as our mother Aisha رضي الله عنها says — she said to our Prophet ﷺ one day: "O Messenger of Allah, I think that the most difficult day that ever came upon you was the day of Uhud." And the Prophet ﷺ responded to her and said: "No, but rather the most difficult day was the day that I went to Ta'if to call those people to Islam, and instead they pelted me with stones and they made me run — they exiled me from their town and their city using stones and pebbles until the Prophet ﷺ was bleeding from his body." The Prophet ﷺ, after he left Ta'if, was given the opportunity to seek revenge, to take retribution, to exact some form of punishment upon those people who harmed him — yet the Prophet ﷺ instead said to that angel of the mountains: "Rather I hope that one day from them and from their children will be those who will worship Allah alone, those who will say لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ."

And that's why the Prophet ﷺ, when you look throughout his seerah, rarely — except in a few circumstances — did he ever make du'a against specific tribes and specific people from amongst the disbelievers. Rather instead he would make du'a for them.

The Du'a for the People of Daws

As the Prophet ﷺ one time when Tufayl ibn Amr رضي الله عنه came and said:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 2937; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2524)

Tufayl ibn Amr was from amongst the tribal leaders of a tribe known as Daws. He said: "O Messenger of Allah, indeed my people at Daws — my tribe — they have rejected you and they have disobeyed you, so make du'a against them, ask Allah to punish them." The narrator says the companions thought that the Prophet ﷺ would make du'a against those people, but instead he said: "O Allah, guide the people of Daws and bring them to me." And Allah accepted that du'a, and the people of Daws would eventually accept Islam.

The Du'a for the People of Thaqif

Those people of Ta'if — the people of Thaqif — again the Prophet ﷺ was told, because of the harm that they did to the Muslims: "O Messenger of Allah, make du'a against them." But instead he said:

"O Allah, guide the people of Thaqif and bring them to us." And Allah responded to that du'a, and they accepted Islam.

The Narration of Abdullah ibn Mas'ud

Abdullah ibn Mas'ud رضي الله عنه said:

He said رضي الله عنه: "It is as if I can see before me" — he is remembering — "it is as if I can see before me the Prophet ﷺ narrating a story from the Prophets — one of those Prophets who passed before us — his people beat him so profusely that he was wiping blood from his face, but as he was doing it he said: 'O Allah, forgive my people for indeed they do not know.'" This was the methodology of the Prophets of Allah. This was the example of our Prophet ﷺ when he dealt with those people who would refuse him — and not just refuse him, but they would harm him physically and verbally and in many other ways as well. The Prophet ﷺ showed his mercy to those people even after he was able to exact punishment and revenge over them.

The Man Who Drew the Sword

In the battle — as you all know — the famous incident where the Prophet ﷺ was lying down and resting, and the companions were dispersed and far away from him, and he had placed his sword on a branch and began to rest under a tree. A disbeliever came and found the Prophet ﷺ all alone, with his own blade hanging on this branch of the tree. He took the sword, and the Prophet ﷺ woke up. He pointed it towards him and said: "O Muhammad, who will save you from me?" The Prophet ﷺ replied with all trust and reliance upon Allah: "Allah will save me." The man dropped the sword and couldn't do anything. So the Prophet ﷺ took the blade and pointed it at the man and said: "Now who will save you from me?" — he was intent on killing him; it wasn't a joke, it wasn't a prank, he was intent on killing the Prophet ﷺ. "Now who will save you from me?" So the man replied: "O Muhammad, be gentle in the way that you take the sword." So the Prophet ﷺ let him go — forgave him, pardoned him — even though moments before he was intent on killing him.

The Conquest of Mecca and the Verse of Surah Yusuf

Those people of Mecca — who not just for one month or one year or two years, but for the vast majority of the life of the Prophet ﷺ's prophethood wanted to decimate Islam and kill him and destroy the Muslims — those same people of Mecca, in the 8th year of the Hijrah, when the Prophet ﷺ returned as a conqueror and as a victor and he came and he conquered the city of Mecca — he gathered those people in the Ka'bah, around the Ka'bah in Al-Masjid Al-Haram, and he said to them — all of their leaders — for all of the harm that they did, all of the Muslims that they killed including people like his own uncle Hamza رضي الله عنه, all of the harm that they caused to the Muslims and to Islam, all of the personal attacks that they made against the Prophet ﷺ — he said to them: "What do you think that I will do to you now?" So they said to him: "You are our son and the son of our fathers — be good towards us." So the Prophet ﷺ recited to them the verse of Surah Yusuf — the same thing that Yusuf عليه السلام said to his brothers once they came back to him and he had the ability to take revenge for what they did to him:

"There will be no revenge upon you today. May Allah forgive you all, and He is the most merciful of those who show mercy." Those people all left, and when they left, the vast majority of them — if not all of them — would come back and accept Islam.

The Prophet's Sadness at Their Rejection

This is how the Prophet ﷺ dealt with them — not because he didn't take things personally or wouldn't become sad when they attacked him or when they said these things about him. But we know, because Allah tells us in the Quran, that it would sadden him:

"We know that your heart becomes upset because of that which they say about you." But the Prophet ﷺ — his greater objective was that these people would accept Islam — to the extent that just moments before their death, or sometimes even after their death, the Prophet ﷺ would still try to have Allah's forgiveness for them.

The Jewish Boy on His Deathbed

Even moments before their death — like in the example of the hadith of Anas رضي الله عنه: there was a boy who was Jewish, who lived in Medina and served the Prophet ﷺ. One day the Prophet ﷺ heard that this boy was severely ill, so he went to visit him. He was on his deathbed and sitting next to him was his father. This boy was not a Muslim, he did not accept Islam — but the Prophet ﷺ's main goal was that this one boy should accept Islam. So he said to him: "Accept Islam — say لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ." The boy was severely ill, on his deathbed. He looked towards his father, and his father said: "Obey Abu al-Qasim" — meaning the Prophet ﷺ. So the boy took the shahada, and then he passed away. The Prophet ﷺ came out and said: "All praise is due to Allah, the One who saved him from the fire." To the last very moment of their death — before they die — the Prophet ﷺ is eager that they should have Islam, that they should be guided, that Allah should forgive them and shower His mercy upon them.

The Janazah of Abdullah ibn Ubay ibn Salul

But sometimes even after their death the Prophet ﷺ would try — as in the story that is mentioned in al-Bukhari and Muslim of Abdullah ibn Ubay ibn Salul, the leader of the hypocrites in Medina. When he passed away — and he was the leader of the hypocrites of Medina — he was the one who in the battle of Uhud, when the Muslims were going to face the army of the Meccans, returned with a third of the army; him and all of his followers left the Muslims to fight on their own. He was the one in the battle of Ahzab and the trench, when all of the different factions of the Arabs had gathered, who from within Medina was trying to break Islam. They were the ones who at every single turn, every single point, tried to harm the Muslims. They were the ones who were trying to destroy Islam from within. And the Prophet ﷺ knew who they were, and he knew that Abdullah ibn Ubay was not just from amongst them but their leader.

When he passed away, his son Abdullah ibn Abdullah ibn Ubay — who was a companion and a Muslim — came to the Prophet ﷺ and said: "O Messenger of Allah, my father has died. Will you give me your top robe, your top garment, that I may shroud my father within it?" Why? In the hopes that perhaps Allah will have some mercy upon his father due to the clothing of the Prophet ﷺ. So the Prophet ﷺ gave it to him. Then he said: "O Messenger of Allah, will you pray over my father — will you lead his janazah?" And the Prophet ﷺ said yes.

When the janazah was prepared, he came out to pray and lead that prayer. Umar ibn al-Khattab رضي الله عنه grabbed onto the clothing of the Prophet ﷺ and said: "O Messenger of Allah, how can you pray over him when he did what he did — how can you pray over him?" So the Prophet ﷺ said: "Because my Lord never forbade me to pray over him. Rather He said to me:"

"Whether you seek forgiveness for them or don't seek forgiveness for them — even if you seek forgiveness for them seventy times, Allah will not forgive them." He said: "I will seek forgiveness for him more than seventy times." — and this was before the revelation of the prohibition came down. So the Prophet ﷺ led his janazah. And it was after this that Allah revealed:

"Don't pray over those hypocrites and don't stand upon their graves." The meaning is though, that before that prohibition came down, the Prophet ﷺ was eager — despite the evil and the harm that this man caused in Medina, even the slandering of his wife Aisha رضي الله عنها, which was due to people like him and his group who spread those rumors about the honor of the Prophet ﷺ — yet still, this was the way that the Prophet ﷺ would respond.

And that is why Allah mentioned in the Quran that he was of a great character:

And that he was sent as a mercy for all of the worlds:

بَارَكَ اللَّهُ لِي وَلَكُمْ فِي الْقُرْآنِ وَالسُّنَّةِ وَنَفَعَنِي وَإِيَّاكُمْ بِمَا فِيهِ مِنَ الْآيَاتِ وَالْحِكْمَةِ. أَقُولُ مَا تَسْمَعُونَ وَأَسْتَغْفِرُ اللَّهَ لِي وَلَكُمْ وَلِجَمِيعِ الْمُسْلِمِينَ مِنْ كُلِّ ذَنْبٍ فَاسْتَغْفِرُوهُ إِنَّهُ هُوَ الْغَفُورُ الرَّحِيمُ.

Second Part of the Khutbah

الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ عَلَى إِحْسَانِهِ وَالشُّكْرُ لَهُ عَلَى تَوْفِيقِهِ وَامْتِنَانِهِ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنْ لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ وَحْدَهُ لَا شَرِيكَ لَهُ تَعْظِيمًا لِشَأْنِهِ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنَّ نَبِيَّنَا وَسَيِّدَنَا مُحَمَّدًا عَبْدُهُ وَرَسُولُهُ الدَّاعِي إِلَى رِضْوَانِهِ صَلَّى اللَّهُ وَسَلَّمَ وَبَارَكَ عَلَيْهِ وَعَلَى آلِهِ وَصَحْبِهِ وَإِخْوَانِهِ وَسَلَّمَ تَسْلِيمًا كَثِيرًا. أَمَّا بَعْدُ.

To be explicit and clear: in no way do I intend or mean that it is allowed or justifiable in any way to mock our Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ or to make fun of him or to make fun of the religion of Islam — and for that matter, to make fun of anyone — that is something which in our religion we don't accept.

But at the same time, the point of today's khutbah was to show and to display that the best of guidance and examples is the guidance and example of our Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ, and that there isn't a single thing that comes upon us in this religion, nor a single challenge that we face in our lives, except that the principles and the example and the guidance in the way that we respond to it will be found either in the book of Allah or in the sunnah of the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ. And this is what we believe — it is part of our iman.

As Allah says in the Quran: a Book whose verses have been perfected and then detailed, from One who is All-Wise and Acquainted. Allah has explained everything that we need to know, that we require in our lives as Muslims. It is there within the Quran — you will find that principle, that guidance; you will find that example within the book of Allah and within the sunnah of the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ.

Times of Trial and Fitna

We live in times of trial, in times of fitan. And the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ, as is collected in Sahih Muslim, said:

(Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2908)

"By the One in whose hand is my soul, this world will never finish — the Day of Judgment won't come — until a time comes upon the people that the one who kills doesn't know why he's killing, and the one who was killed doesn't know why he was killed." These are the times that we live in today, where people don't know their religion anymore, where people go around indiscriminately killing people, not going back to the book of Allah nor the sunnah of the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ.

And no doubt that the way — and the only way — to safeguard ourselves and our families and to make sure that we're steadfast upon this religion, and that what we do is in accordance with that which Allah has legislated and that which the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ commanded us to do, is by going back to the book of Allah and the sunnah of the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ — in accordance with the understanding of those great generations of Muslims: the companions and their students and those who followed them in righteousness. That is our methodology. That is our religion. That is the religion that the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ left for us.

And so each and every single one of us, we need to understand that all of our life — every single moment that we live as Muslims — it is dictated by Allah and by the Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ. Our emotions are secondary to what we find in the Quran and the sunnah. Our rationale — what we think may be good or right — it is secondary to what is found in the Quran and the sunnah, and it is predicated upon what we find in the Quran and the sunnah.

Closing Du'a

We ask Allah that He keeps us firm and steadfast in these times of trial, that Allah makes us from amongst those whom He keeps steadfast on His religion, and that He makes us from amongst those who hold on to His book and the sunnah and example of His Prophet صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ. That Allah safeguards us and our families from evil, that Allah gives us stability in our communities, that Allah allows us to worship Him in the way that He loves and the way that He has legislated, that Allah showers His mercy and forgiveness upon us all, and that He grants us His pleasure and His Jannah.

هَذَا وَاللَّهُ أَعْلَمُ وَنِسْبَةُ الْعِلْمِ إِلَيْهِ أَسْلَمُ وَصَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَى نَبِيِّنَا مُحَمَّدٍ وَعَلَى آلِهِ وَصَحْبِهِ أَجْمَعِينَ وَآخِرُ دَعْوَانَا أَنِ الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ.