Our noble brother Abū Khadījah concluded the previous session regarding the position of Ahl al-Sunnah regarding the Jamāʿah and being upon clarity with regards to their ʿaqīdah and those who have strayed from it from the deviants and the misguided ones. He continues this series entering into a discussion and explanation of the work of the great Imām Abū ʿUthmān al-Ṣābūnī (raḥimahullāh) drawing upon benefits from his treatise entitled ʿAqīdah al-Salaf wa Aṣ‘ḥāb al-Ḥadīth, The Creed of the Salaf and the Companions of Ḥadīth alongside the explanation of Shaykh Rabīʿ ibn Hādī al-Madkhalī (ḥafiẓahullāh) with regards to the following affair:
Imām al-Ṣābūnī mentions: ‘One of the distinguishing signs of Ahl al-Sunnah wa-al-Jamāʿah is their love for the Imāms of the Sunnah, its Scholars, its helpers and its close allies, and their hatred for the leaders of innovation who call to the hellfire and direct their associates to the home of torment and destruction. And Allāh the Sublime has adorned the hearts of Ahl al-Sunnah with love for the Scholars of Ahl al-Sunnah as a bounty from Allāh, Whose Magnificence is Perfect and Sublime.’
From the distinguishing signs of Ahl al-Sunnah is their love for Ahl al-Sunnah wa-al-Jamāʿah and the Imāms of the Sunnah, so if you see a man loving the Imāms of the Sunnah like Sufyān al-Thawrī, al-Awzāʿī, Aḥmad ibn Hanbal, al-Bukhārī, Muslim, Abū Zurʿah, Mujāhid and other than them from the Imāms of the Sunnah, then know that this is a sign that this is a person from Ahl al-Sunnah. It is obligatory to love them and ally oneself with them, because they are believers, and there is not a believer in truth except that they ally with them and love them because they are the from the awlīyāh of Allāh.
Alongside this love for the Imāms and Scholars of Ahl al-Sunnah, then likewise it is imperative that one stays away from the people of innovation and does not debate with them nor argue with them. In doing this the people may say you are afraid of them, however as one of the Salaf said in response to this, ‘By Allāh, just like the fox said regarding the dog, ‘I know a hundred ways in which to outwit the dog, but nothing is better for me than that he does not see me and I do not see him.’ And this is because the fox is aware that he is more intelligent than this dopy dog and can outwit him, but he knows that nothing is better than that he stays away from the dog.
As Ayyūb al-Sakhtiyānī said, ‘Indeed there is nothing more devastating upon Ahl al-Bidʿah than sukūt (silence).’
And thus these are the levels of abandonment of the callers to innovation, such as the likes of Hamza Yūsuf, Nūh Hā Mīm Keller, and even the likes of Yāsir Qādhī, you do not talk to them nor debate with them, and those who know about their affair then it it is for them, if they have the ability and knowledge of the misguidance that they are upon, to warn against them for the sake of the protection of the Muslim Ummah, and whilst warning against their evil innovations, then it is from the ʿaqīdah of Ahl al-Sunnah not to mention good qualities or characteristics they may possess.
