Waleed Basyouni – Is Music Haram in Islam- Exploring the Boundaries and Permissibility of Music
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The speakers discuss the use of duff as a token during certain circumstances, where it is restricted. They stress the importance of listening to music and limiting the use of the duff in certain circumstances. The speakers also touch on the definition of an instrument and the potential for expansion to other instruments. They emphasize the importance of music as a social and educational vehicle and encourage listeners to use it in a non- harmful way. They also discuss the difference between Islam and life, including the love for music, the love for learning, and setting priorities when new Muslims are faced.
AI: Summary ©
As-salamu alaykum, Shaykh.
Wa alaykum as-salam.
We have a question about music.
It was actually sent by one of the
youngsters who put it in the suggestion box.
He says, at what extent is music haram?
That's the question right here.
Bismillah alhamdulillah, salam alaykum wa rahmatullah.
The four madhab agreed that music instruments are
haram, and I want to take this opportunity
to differentiate between two things, that some people
sometimes either misunderstand or mislead people with it,
which is, there is a debate exists among
some of the scholars in regard to singing,
al-ghinaa, and some people mix between this
and music.
As far as I know, there is an
agreement on the music instruments, but there is
some scholars in Medina and some ulama, they
talked about singing, you know, is it allowed,
is it not allowed, is it haram before
the Nasr, because it's fitna, because of what
caused, and all this kind of debate.
But like just full-fledged to the music,
you know, that's something that agreed upon between
the fuqaha rahimahullah, or at least the overwhelming
majority of the fuqaha rahimahullah, I'm not claiming
he's a consensus, but I'm saying the overwhelming
number in the fuqaha al-madhahib, they agree
it is haram, as Shaykh As-Samit Ameer
rahimahullah said, that the four madhahib agreed on
the hurmat alat al-azf, or alat al
-musiqa, or alat al-ghinaa, the musical instruments.
So and this is something should be avoided,
and the Muslims should avoid that.
Another point, we have to, in my opinion,
there is a difference between doing the musics
and listening to the musics.
Or hearing it.
Okay.
The difference also between hearing and listening.
Yeah, exactly.
So when it comes to listening to the
musics, there is, you listen to it for
the purpose of listening to it, or just
hearing it.
It can be a background in an app
that you use, and use, or you're in
a restaurant and there's a musics playing, you
know, as a background.
You as a Muslim, you're not supposed to
do this background musics.
But if it exists, it will not make
this whole entire toy, or game, or whatever
you're watching or video, or documentary, for example.
So it will, in my opinion, will not
be haram because you're not listening to it,
you're just hearing it.
And there's a difference between the two.
Because in Nabi Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, he said,
إِنَّمَا الْأَعْمَالُ بِالنِّيَّاتِ You're basically action based on
intention.
Some people say, but what would you do
with Ibn Umar, when he heard, you know,
somebody playing with the float, and he put
his fingers in his ear.
I said, that's exactly why I'm saying this,
Ibn Umar did this to make the point.
But he did not tell the man with
him, or his servant, close your eyes, close
your ear too.
He asked him, did he finish?
If it was haram, it has to be
haram for both of them.
Right.
So that means he did not tell him
that, because he's just not listening to it,
he's just hearing it.
So that evidence is not really a very
strong argument, in my opinion, to say that
it is not allowed.
Also that lead me to say, instruments, some
instruments was allowed in certain circumstances.
Like for example, in Eid, which is a
duff, and also were allowed in the wedding.
A duff is like a drum, the repercussion.
Yeah, a drum that has one side, you
know.
So Nabi Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam allowed to use
that in the case of Eid, celebrating Eid
or wedding.
Also, allowed it, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, in a
time of very special, happy occasion.
Like wedding?
No, other than the wedding and Eid.
That's why when Sayyid Muslim, a woman came
and said, Ya Rasulallah, Inni nathartu an adlul
wa duffa ala raasika an raddaka allahu salima.
Ya Rasulallah, I made a promise that I
will play with the duff and be celebrating
your return safe.
So it's a victory to something good, you
know, something very special.
So from this also, we can say in
a very special occasion, very happy occasion, maybe
you can use the duff as well.
Maybe a newborn baby, maybe graduations and stuff
like that.
Are we supposed to limit this to the
duff or can we expand this to other
musical instruments?
So when Nabi Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, so restricting
it to the occasion, can also, do we
have to restrict also the instrument, which is
a duff, or it can be said, no,
we can expand these to other instruments as
well.
You'll see that there is almost an agreement
in the Fuqaha, Rahim Allah, and they will,
the overwhelming, will say no, restrict it to
the duff itself.
To the instrument itself.
An instrument which is the duff, not to
open the door for pianos and like guitars
and like.
So that's that's an area where I think
you can might find.
A room for debate and more looking into
those, but it's restricted to these occasions, is
not like for open a door for it
doesn't become like a lot of musical lifestyle.
Your lifestyle is based on music.
It's like you're doing it daily.
Yes.
Another thing I want to say here also
when it comes to music, some of the
scholars talked about if there is a music,
the whole music is about it's about this
rhythm that, you know, it looks like almost
intoxicate the person, you know, touch the heart
and it's makes you cry sometimes, makes you
laugh, right, hyped up.
And that's why allowed, for example, drums in
the war, the Hanabira and others that allowed
it.
Why?
Because it give you that excitement and the
strength and also put fear in the in
the heart of the enemy, you know, and
get the people so riled up in the
battlefield.
But do you want you don't want something
like it's like a drug to give you
that strong boost in a regular life style
or a lot of time.
What are you going to do with that
energy?
What is it like for?
It is like and that's why you see
a lot of time music associated with harm,
with dancing, with Xena, with adultery, with, you
know, drugs, with a lot of time it's
associated, not all of them, but a lot
of them associated with this.
And I think that's part of the the
hype that you get from listen to these.
It's like emotional manipulation.
What if we say, can I use the
music in a way and in a way
that it will not lead to this?
It's not meant for a thought.
It's not meant for, you know, put you
in the mood.
No, it is basically just an introduction to
get your attention.
Like something like that, just to get attention,
like for news, for something like, you know,
now he's coming in and you do this
in the background.
I have heard some of the scholars argue
that this type is not what the Sharia
came to make it haram and forbidden.
I don't have personally a position about those
like to say it's halal or anything like
that.
I still think it should be avoided.
And I will end with this, the reality
is this, the reality that music's today, the
world, the industrial music today, it's about what
it's about, things that no Muslim will ever
allow.
All these video clips, all MTV's, all this
like, you know, records, all this, you know,
musicians and singers and pop, the pop culture
and all this kind of things.
What is it?
What is it calling people to do?
And I want to remind everybody with what
Ibn Mas'ud said, والله لا يجتمعين في
قلبي مؤمن I will never be in the
heart of a mu'min.
The love for music and singing and the
love for the Quran, one of them will
kick the other one out.
So I met a brother who's not doing
this kind of bad singing.
He's actually doing some nasheed art.
But use music instruments.
And he's very famous.
I'm not going to mention his name.
So I met him in one of the
conferences and I asked him a question.
I said, I want to ask you a
question.
We got close.
So I asked him a question.
I said, Habibi, tell me with all honesty,
how's your relationship with the Quran?
Wow.
Wallahi, he looked at me and he put
his head down and he was in tears.
And he said, Wallahi, Sheikh Waleed, nobody asked
me this question for a long time.
But I lost it.
I lost that touch, that love for the
Quran.
Even when I read the Quran, I still
think of the rhythm, the how the rhythm
of the music goes and more than anything
else.
And he was crying.
Yeah, that's wow.
And I just remember what Ibn Mas'ud
said.
So why our young men and women today
are not attached to the Quran?
Why is it so hard for kids to
tell me the Quran is very hard to
memorize?
Allah said, Allah made the Quran easy.
It's not just the barrier of language.
Because the majority of those who memorize the
Quran are not Arab.
Yeah, it's the barrier between your heart and
the Quran.
That's the problem.
And that barrier is built through the love
for the musics and constant listening to it
and being into it.
I also remember in one of my classes,
a brother came to me.
He was a new Muslim and he was
so into the music world.
And he told me, Sheikh, what's the ruling
in musics and singing?
He's a robber.
And I told him, he said to me
that he had a like a gold record,
something like that.
I think maybe a million cubby or something
like that.
Like he sold of his songs or his
album.
He's a new Muslim.
So I said to him, you know, you
don't need to worry about this right now.
I want he said, no, no, no, Sheikh,
I want to know.
Because I heard people saying it's halal.
I said, it's not halal.
He said, Alhamdulillah.
I was like shocked when he said Alhamdulillah.
I said, why?
He said, Sheikh, I all my life was
in the musical world.
Sheikh, he told me this.
He said musics and songs, it's a way
of life.
And Islam is a way of life.
And they are very different ways of life.
It teaches you everything.
How to live your life.
I mean, not the same.
You know, and that's, I never forget that
moment.
It was Madrasa Islamiyah when I used to
teach there.
So what I'm saying here, be careful about
your heart.
Ibn Mas'ud said, the love for musics
and songs.
And it creates hypocrisy in the heart.
You know, that the double standard.
I love the Quran, but in reality, I'm
not attached to it.
You can, you can make whatever claim.
But again, I'm talking about the people who
are so relaxed about it, listen to it,
like into it.
You know, I'm not talking about you watching
a program and it has a music background.
Or like maybe a documentary or a movie
or something that has the background.
Or you're not going to listen to it
purposely.
You know, this is an area where I
see, you know, in the gray area.
Yes, the person tried their best.
But I'm talking about the person who, you
know, completely merged into this.
Immersed in it.
Yes.
Immersed.
Right.
Even the gray area, try to reduce it
as much as you can.
Clean our heart and cleanse our heart from
the love of the thing that Allah have
said.
Wow.
And the salt of Shaytan, as Ibn Abbas
and others said, And
Abu Bakr called it the instrument of Satan.
And the Prophet said, no, that's a Eid.
So that's a lot.
That shows you that the permissibility has to
do with the time and occasions.
Right.
So I understand that music is something that
people appreciate.
People express their thoughts.
Even children, when you listen to music, it's
a natural thing.
That's why Sharia allowed it in certain time,
certain occasions.
But not for all the time.
And we don't, what we need to focus
on, in my opinion, is the reality of
what people listen to today.
What's people learning from, you know, I don't
want to mention name, but what people learning
from Madonna?
What people learning from, you know, what do
you learn from Taylor Swift?
What are you learning from?
We can go on all these names today.
What you learn from, you know, what's the
message that you get?
What kind of role model?
Yeah.
And unfortunately, and I don't want to make
name to pick on some individual, but what's
the message that our community, our youth are
learning?
Yes, I'm not saying that those people don't
have maybe some good message too.
I don't know because I don't listen to
them.
But I think in general, in general, the
message, the image, the clothing, the model that
you're presenting to people, it's not a good
one.
It does not, it's not a good, according
to Ordin at least.
And by their own, by their own slip
of the tongues.
I mean, these artists like Beyonce and even
Kanye West and all these artists.
Like Beyonce said, when she's on the stage,
she feels like she's a different person.
Things she's, she's not the person that she
lives in real life.
And that she feels like she is kind
of like possessed or something.
And I'm not trying to, it's like there
is, there's a persona to it that really
is very dangerous and invites people to a
complete satanic lifestyle.
And that has been in there.
And in this concert, a lot of drugs,
a lot of like, you know, haram things
happen, you know, closeness to each other's, you
know.
So there's a lot of things also in
this concert, like not allowed for a Muslim
to even think about being part, taking part
of it.
One of the lyrics that, I don't know,
correct me if I'm wrong, brother Kahari.
Kanye West, when he said, my body is
my temple, right?
So what does that even mean?
He sings it and our youth, you know,
they keep, I heard students that were my
students repeating these words.
I mean, what does it mean to say
my body is my temple?
And, you know, so there is a like
a spiritual aspect to it that is not,
you know, aligned with Islam at all.
Now my question is, I know I don't
want to prolong this question more than it
should.
And why did you have reservation in telling
the brother when he told him, you know,
don't worry about this right now, because he
was a new Muslim, just converted to Islam?
Yeah, because you have to set priorities when
new Muslims, especially things that people so attached
to it, hard to get rid of.
Yeah, that's a very good point.
I'm not allowed to tell a new Muslim
lie.
If you ask me, I'm not allowed to
tell him it's halal, then surprise you later,
by the way, it wasn't.
Yeah, no, but I can delay the ruling,
explaining the ruling until.
Until he's ready.
He's ready.
He's strong in Iman.
His Iman is stronger than love for Allah,
stronger than the love for music.
But if his love for Allah is not
strong enough now, but his attached dunya is
more beloved to him than Allah SWT, you're
willing to give Allah, because you'll go with
what you love the most, what you're attached
to the most.
Okay.
JazakAllah khair.
Yaksha.