Sayings of the Salaf

People Change & Allah Forgives

It is reported that ʿAbdullāh b. Masʿūd – Allāh be pleased with him – said:

Do not be hasty in praising people or blaming them, for perhaps what pleases you from a person today will displease you tomorrow, and perhaps what displeases you today, will please you tomorrow. Indeed, people change. It is Allāh who forgives the sins. And Allāh is more merciful to his servant the day he meets him than a mother who lays out a bed for her child in an empty patch of land and feels [the ground]: if there is a risk of being stung, it will be her instead of him (her child), and if there is a risk of being pricked by a thorn, it will be her instead of him.

Al-Bayhaqī, Shuʿab Al-Īmān article 6177, and others.

ʿAbdullāh b. Masʿūd

Forgiveness Manners and Conduct Repentance Sins
When the Sinful and the Rabble Take Knowledge

ʿAbdullāh b. Masʿūd – Allāh be pleased with him – said:

The people will not cease to be well as long as they take knowledge from their seniors. When they take it from their juniors and their bad people, they will be destroyed.

Ibn ʿAbd Al-Barr, Jāmiʿ Bayān Al-ʿIlm article 1057.

Al-Firyābī reports:

When Sufyān [Al-Thawrī] would see these rabble writing knowledge his face would change (in anger). So I asked him, ‘O Abū ʿAbdillāh, we notice that when you see these people writing knowledge, it is hard upon you.’ He replied, ‘Knowledge used to be with the Arabs and with the leaders of the people, but when it left them and went to these types – meaning the rabble of society – the religion was changed.’

Op. cit. article 1072.

Sufyān Al-Thawrī ʿAbdullāh b. Masʿūd

Character Fitnah Knowledge Sins
The Strangeness of Iman

It is reported that ʿAbdullāh b. Al-ʿAmr b. Al-ʿĀṣ – Allāh be pleased with him – said:

Nifāq (hypocrisy) used to be something unusual amongst all the Īmān. Soon, Īmān will be something strange amongst all the nifāq.

Ibn Baṭṭah, Al-Ibānah 1:173 article 6.

ʿAbdullāh b. ʿAmr

Fitnah Hypocrisy Īman ʿAqīdah
Not Even if You Have a Response

It is reported that Al-Ḥasan Al-Baṣrī – Allāh have mercy on him – said:

Do not sit with the people of desires (Bidʿah, heresy), even if you think you have a response [to what they say].

Al-Harawī, Dhamm Al-Kalām article 765.

Al-Ḥasan Al-Baṣrī

Bidʿah Fitnah Refutations ʿAqīdah
We Take Our Religion from the Companions

ʿAbbād b. Al-ʿAwwām narrates:

Sharīk b. ʿAbdillāh came to us around fifty years ago, and we said to him, “O Abū ʿAbdillāh, here amongst us there are people from the Muʿtazilah who reject these āḥādīth [like]: ‘Allāh descends to the lowest heaven’, and ‘the people of Jannah will see their Lord’. So Sharīk narrated to me around ten such narrations, then said: ‘As for us, we have taken our religion from the sons of the Tābiʿīn, from the Ṣaḥābah. Who have they taken from?’”

Al-Ḏahabī, Al-ʿUluw. Graded ṣaḥīḥ by Al-Albānī in Mukhtaṣar Al-ʿUluw article 146.

Ṣaḥābah

Bidʿah Knowledge Names and Attributes of Allāh Refutations ʿAqīdah
The Whole Year for Ramadan

It is reported that Muʿlā b. Al-Faḍl – Allāh have mercy on him – said:

They (the Salaf) used to supplicate to Allāh for six months asking Him to get them to the month of Ramaḍān; and they used to supplicate for six months that Allāh accept [their fasting and other worship in Ramaḍān].

Abul-Qāsim Al-Aṣbahānī, Al-Targhīb wa Al-Tarhīb article 1761.

The Salaf

Fasting Good Deeds Ramadan Supplication Worship
Why is Knowledge Learned?

It is reported that Sufyān Al-Thawrī – Allāh have mercy on him – said:

Knowledge is only learned to [apply it and] put into practice the Taqwā of Allāh the mighty and sublime.

Abū Bakr Al-Daynūrī, Al-Mujālasah wa Jawāhir Al-ʿIlm article 943.

Sufyān Al-Thawrī

Knowledge Taqwā
If a Person is Exposed, It’s not his First Sin

Anas b. Mālik reports:

A young man who had stolen was brought to ʿUmar (for punishment). He said, “By Allāh I have never stolen before this time.” So ʿUmar responded, “You lie, Allāh would not (or does not) surrender a servant of His on the first sin.”

Abū Dāwūd, Al-Zuhd article 56, and others. Graded ṣaḥīh by Ibn Kathīr and others.

ʿUmar b. Al-Khaṭṭāb

Law Sins Theft Wisdom
The Worst Fitnah

It is reported that Ḥudhayfah – Allāh be pleased with him – was asked:

“What is the worst fitnah?” He replied, “That good and evil is presented to you and you do not know which of them to follow.”

Ibn Abī Shaybah, Al-Muṣannaf, Kitāb Al-Fitan, article 38565.

Ḥudhayfah b. Al-Yamān

Fitnah Knowledge Signs of The Hour
The Reason Behind Forgetting Quran

It is reported that Al-Ḍaḥḥāk b. Muzāḥim, the famous scholar of tafsīr from the Tābiʿīn, said:

No one who has learned Qurān and then forgotten it except due to a sin he has committed, because Allāh the most high said:

وَمَآ أَصَـٰبَكُم مِّن مُّصِيبَةٍ فَبِمَا كَسَبَتْ أَيْدِيكُمْ

Qurān 42:30

“And no calamity befalls you except due to what your own hands have earnt.”

And forgetting the Qurān is one of the greatest calamities.

Al-Bayhaqī, Shuʿab Al-Īmān article 1813, and others.

Al-Ḍaḥḥāk b. Muzāḥim

Knowledge Qurān Sins