Yasir Qadhi – Was Selecting a Khalifa MORE Important than the Prophet’s Muhammad Burial
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The speakers discuss the importance of establishing Islamic polity and achieving political unity after the implementation of Khalifa. They emphasize the need for unity and cooperation in achieving political unity, while also acknowledging the importance of Islam's values and the need for cooperation and integration. The Sharia is fixed based on principles and manata, and the reality is moving. The flexible legal framework is not applicable in certain circumstances, and the Sharia is fixed based on principles and manata. The speakers also discuss the concept of endorsement and the influence of people on their actions.
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The pushback from their side is
that you are neglecting the fact that
the sahaba understood
that this was so important
that they delayed the burial of the prophet
sallallahu alaihi wa sallam or even if you
don't say delay it they didn't even
wait for his burial
until they had elected Amir. So for them,
having an khalifa and having, Islamic political entity
was so important
that even the burial of the prophet did
not take precedence over that. So they argue
to us, this is ijma'a of the Sahaba
that you must actively
work towards establishing
an Islamic
polity. I completely concur.
That's order versus anarchy. That is not singular
political entity. So then this leads us to
the the the the other point, which is
a very difficult one.
And just keep in mind that there are
many Ijma'as that have been reported on many
issues.
Like, look at the Ijmaa for instance, that
the Khalifa has to be a Qurashi. Isn't
that an Ijmaa? Well, no. Because of waniyah
and others in part of this. But, yeah,
some have said there's Ijmaa. Yes. Yeah. Many
have said there's a j'ma. Many reported this
j'ma. Even though as usual there's no j'ma
but khed. Yes. It's reported. But can can
can you neglect Al Ansar who who said
that Did he even know it was there?
Exactly. My point is this incident has a
lot of deep Can can you also neglect
Omar who said if Abu Ubaydah
were alive, I would have not Mhmm. Thought
about anyone else. And if he were not
and if he was not, then I would
have chosen Mu'adh. And in some other hadith,
he said,
both Mu'adh and Salim Mu'adh Abu Haifa are
not from Quraysh. They're not even So
Even says that people who are reported as
mad, they need to figure out how to
reinterpret
this statement.
They can either say it's muttamal, you know,
to say that Umar,
changed his mind later
or that the Ijma happened after Umar.
And anyone who knows about this knows that
the difficulty of having an Ijma after Umar.
Yes. You know, the difficulty of establishing an
ijma after Omar.
So so you have Ansar, you know, unaware
of the of of this sort of indubitable
fact of the aqeedah of the Muslimen. Clearly
developed after. What was the And then Omar
also unaware that that it's just it's
this is not
Mount This is just not the Hajjika. Jayed.
So then, Sheikh, let me then let me
then be very explicit because you're in my
humble opinion, you seem to be squirting around
a very awkward reality.
And I wanna verbalize it and so let's
deconstruct this reality.
You seem to be
very clearly
insinuating
that these
hadith or let me just say the concept
of Imara and Khalifa and leadership and whatnot
that as long as there is civil order
and as long as anarchy is eliminated,
that
to a great extent,
the spirit of what the Sharia wants us
to do has been accomplished.
And therefore, it seems to me
that since
we are living in lands where at least
many lands, not all of them, many lands
where anarchy
has is does not exist, there's not complete
lawlessness and chaos.
There there is civil order. There is, a
means of people cooperating together for the greater
good. It seems that the existence
of these systems
mitigates in your eyes,
this notion that other
Islamist movements have of working towards what they
call the Khalifa. Am I correct in this
verbalization?
So as I said I believe that it's
an obligation on us to work towards the
Khalifa as an end goal basically towards
work towards
Muslim unity
or the political expression of that Muslim unity
or actualization
of that Muslim unity
but
there are many other priorities,
and
it it depends on what we mean by
the falafel
and,
which strategies we we will adopt
to achieve that political unity.
And
I don't believe
that
we can just have the Khalifa
drop down from the heavens on us. Like,
you know, we we just can't have We
can't start by the falafel.
This notion
that we will overthrow the government in in
Morocco, for instance, and march the troops
from Morocco to Jakarta
and and use, you know, some uprisings here
and there to enable us By the way,
Morocco is just an example. It's just not
we're not intending any cool just put the
record here. It's just like it's just sitting
down for guys. But but but but but
this thought that you overthrow the government in
one place, you take over the that one
country, and then you marshate the your troops
and,
bring everybody under that that that,
central,
rule or government
is is not realistic.
It is not
realistic.
It does not sound feasible.
Now
then
we have to figure out, yes, working towards
Muslim unity is an obligation.
Working towards Muslim,
coordination,
cooperation,
integration
is an obligation.
But what do we mean by this, and
how do we go about it is the
question.
And when you bring, you know,
what what I was
trying to say
is that
certainty belongs to
the Islamic
values and ideas, not a specific
detailed system of governance.
But Islam brought about
certain values that are extremely important for righteous
governance
that we should not neglect.
I have always said this to myself
about what we have done to Islam,
what we have done to the Quran.
You know, I I have
I've been saying to myself
We we basically ignored that silence
it silence it that when it spoke, and
we
made it to speak
when it stayed silent. Mhmm.
Which which means what?
There are certain concepts that are very important,
Islamically
for righteous governance.
Shura is one of them.
And this is not because of liberalism, and
this is not because of modernity.
This is an this is
a surah in the Quran that was named
after Shura. Two verses that spoke
explicitly of Shura.
You know, their their affairs are conducted on
the basis of mutual consultation
and consult them and a surah that was
named after surah. Justice
is an extremely Islamic value. Equality
bet between equals is an is an important
Islamic value.
Separation of powers. You know, the and
the the the story of the shield that
dis disputed over the the Jewish man and
went to the judge. Separation of,
powers within, you know, the
independence of the judiciary
or the judicial
branch,
is is an important and so on. So
there are important some Islamic concepts. Some people
argue that Islam provide a system of governance.
I I don't get entangled in terminology.
So if you think that Islam provided a
system of governance,
system the so I'm not gonna argue with
you over the word system.
I don't believe that Islam provided
details
with regard to governance. Islam provided principles, and
that is the beauty and the genius of
Islam.
Mhmm. Because certain things need to be delineated
in great detail such as because they never
change. And other things related. Other change have
Generic advice. Be adjusted to adapt it to
circumstantial
realities that are variable, that are changing all
the time.
So so think about the Sharia as having
constant objectives and overarching
maxims and then flexible legal framework.
The Sharia itself as Alimam Shattabi says
the
Khitab Khitab Allah is
Allah's address to us is not moving.
It is the reality that is moving.
So
different,
basically,
circumstances will bring about different
rulings not because the Sharia is moving,
it is because the reality is moving. The
Sharia is fixed but the Sharia is based
on principles and manata,
effective causes,
You know that legal justifications or effective causes
the whatever
ratio or whatever
you call it. So those
are fixed. Those maxims are fixed. The reality
is moving.
So when the reality changes, this particular custom
or this particular
matter
would be would fit under a different principle
of Sharia. The principles are fixed. So the
reality itself is moving like this under the
fixed principles of the Sharia. So the flexible
legal framework or the Sharia
will accommodate the differences
in,
in the different times and and different places
as,
you know, the verifying
Erudite scholars have, you know, over and overstated
and emphasized
and reiterated.
So in this particular area,
you know the area of politics, the sphere
of politics.
Things change all the time.
You know the geopolitical
realities, the sociopolitical
realities,
change all the time. Therefore,
having
a fixed detailed
system
would not be
applicable. Yeah. Would not. Yes. And and even
historically, we have seen different iterations of systems.
Of course. Like, whoever said that Al Ahad,
is part of is is recommended by Allah
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. Al Ahad which is basically
passing the covenant on.
So you you spoke about Ibrahim al Mu'ardi
and having a book on,
Siyas al Saraiyah called the Hakam al Sultanayyah.
It's a it's a great book.
But,
how much of it is a is direct
revelation from god, and how much of it
is the Good. Illusions that he had reached
and Yeah. Based on,
his his interpretive effort and the realities that
he was surrounded by. At the same time,
our
Hambari imam,
had written a book called the also.
Which has a lot of overlap
over there today. Lot of similarities who who
A bit too many, but But, but that's
fine.
But but at any rate,
is it a product? Is it basically the
explicit
revelation? No. Absolutely not. Like,
read it. Read it impartially. See how many
hadith,
are are being quoted there.
See see how explicit the implication of the
hadith that are being quoted there. So when
imam says that there are 3 different ways
of,
having legitimate
leadership
or installing an imam.
One of them is mutual consultation
or the Haqq, you know, the idea of
the Haqq, the contract. This should be the
only one.
This is the only one that that is
based on Islamic values.
Al act, a contract.
We are
the we,
the people, the Muslims,
are
We are
basically
the,
the sort of one party in this act.
We may have
like an agent to represent us. Those are
those
who bind and unbind,
but their role is
wakil.
They they are our agent
in choosing an imam
but we are
basically the people entitled
to this right.
We, the Muslims,
are the people entitled to this right. And
if there are if there is a group
of people called,
they are our our Akeel, our agent,
in signing this contract,
in signing this contract with the imam. It's
a contract.
And all the, basically, the conditions of contracts
would apply to it, and we can basically
modify the contract. We can adjust the contract.
We can adapt the contract because Allah
or the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam said that
Muslim wrote to him.
We we will get to how much we
can modify as we go on today. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But but what I'm trying
to say is
the ultimate theory.
Says
that it is also established through,
the covenant
that is being passed
on, the covenant. What does the covenant mean?
The
the concept of Al Ahd, the crown the
crown prince the crown prince. This concept, where
does it come from? Abu Bakr radiAllahu anhu
endorsed Omar.
Imam Zaynayr clearly says
that this endorsement
is not appointment by Abu Bakr. He did
not appoint Omar. He endorsed Omar. Had Omar
not been chosen by the majority of the
companions He wouldn't have this endorsement would not
have meant anything. Yeah.
Likewise, when Omar gave the bayah to Abu
Bakr had, Abu Bakr had not been given
bayah to by the majority of the companions.
Omar
Zabeaha would not have meant anything,
you know, in in Saqifat Bali's side. So,
now now this
or this endorsement
had a different interpretation
according to later,
scholars in later times.
What is it? It it became Binding. Binding.
Yeah.
So it is not endorsement. It is passing
the covenant on to your son or to
your brother or to whomever. And we know
this as well when Wa'awiya
instituted it for his son, there was a
serious backlash amongst the senior Sahaba Of course.
And the sons of the Sahaba and Aisha
and his brothers. Multiple. Yeah. So it's not
that simplistic in this regard. No. Absolutely not.
So So but this became
this became the norm. Mhmm. Historical norm. Historically.
This became the norm. Where is this? And
and the the
I would say I would say
that I appreciate the pragmatism of the fuqaha.
Mhmm. Because they wanted to keep peace and
order. Peace and order. Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate
the pragmatism of the fuqaha. I do not
appreciate the rigidity of the people who read
those books
and consider
this to be Islam.
So the pragmatism of the fuqaha, the flexibility
of the fuqaha.
Rigid people now read those books and they
consider this to be sort of this is
what Islam says.
No. This is basically the fuqaha being flexible
For their time frame.
Pragmatic for their their times. Yeah. And
that was the norm in in their times.