“There is no obedience due to anyone in disobedience to Allaah Tabarak wa Ta’aala.” [Silsilah Saheehah: 179]

“There is no obedience in disobedience to Allaah Tabaraka wa Ta’aala.” [Silsilah Saheehah: 180 ]

“There is no obedience to mankind in disobedience to Allaah, indeed obedience is in goodness.“[Silsilah Saheehah: 181]

The reason for this hadeeth:

The Messenger of Allaah- sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam – dispatched an army, and he commanded a man to lead them, who lit a fire, and the man said to the army: enter into the fire. The people wanted to enter into the fire, but some of them said : verily we have just fled from the fire.

This was mentioned to the Messenger of Allaah – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam – and he said to those who wanted to enter into it: if you entered it you would have remained in it until the Day of Judgment, and he said a good word to the others, and he said…..(the above hadeeth).

The extra wording in the hadeeth is from Tayyalisee and the context is by Muslim.

In another narration by him where he said:

“The Messenger of Allaah – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam – dispatched a battalion and ordered a man from the Ansaar to lead them, and he ordered them to listen to him and obey him. They caused this man to get angry, so he said to them: Gather some firewood for me, so they gathered it for him. Then he said: light the fire and they lit the fire, then he said to them: Did not the Messenger of Allaah – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam – order you to listen and to obey me? They said Yes, of course. He said – enter in to the fire! So they started to look at each other, and said (and in another narration: a young boy said to them) : indeed we fled to the Messenger of Allaah – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam – from the fire, [ do not be hasty, until you meet the Prophet – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam – and if he orders you to enter it, then enter into it ], so this is what they did. The man’s anger came down/subsided, and the fire was put out. When they returned to the Prophet – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam – and mentioned it to him, he said: if you had entered it, you would never have exited from it, indeed obedience is in goodness.”

Narrated by Bukhari (8/47, 13/109), Muslim (6/16), Ahmad (1/82, 134) and other narrations which contain the extra wording is also by Ahmad.

This hadeeth has many benefits, the most important of which is the impermissibility of obedience to anyone, if it is disobedience to Allaah Tabarak wa Ta’aala, whether it is the leaders, scholars and the shaykhs.

Also from this hadeeth you get to know the misguidance of different groups of people;

The first: some of the soofis who obey their shaykhs, even if they command them to commit sins, using as a proof, that they in reality are not committing sins. Also that the shaykh sees that which the follower does not see.

I know a shaykh from amongst these people who appointed himself as a leader. He mentioned a story to his followers in some of his lessons in the masjid, the summary of which is, one of the Soofi shaykhs ordered one of his followers that during the night he should go to his father and kill him while he is in his bed next to his wife! So when he killed him, he returned to the shaykh, happily having carried out the command of the shaykh! The shaykh looked at him and said: Do you think that you have really killed your father? Rather he is your mother’s boyfriend! As for your father he is away!

Then he makes and presents a Sharia’ ruling, as he claims, from his story, and he says to his followers : If a shaykh orders his follower with a ruling which is apparently against the Sharia’, it is upon the followers to obey him in this, then he said: Do you not see this shaykh, he apparently orders the boy to kill his father, however in reality he ordered him to kill the one who fornicated with his mother, and that person deserved to be killed!

The falsity of this story is not hidden according to the Sharia’ from many angles:

Firstly: Carrying out the punishment is not the right of the shaykh, no matter how important he is; rather it is from the right of the leader or the one in charge.

Secondly : if the case was that this actually took place, then why did he only carry out the punishment on the man and not the woman, and they both fornicated?

Thirdly: the Sharia’ ruling for the married adulterer is to be stoned to death, and the person is not killed except by stoning. From this it is clear that the shaykh has opposed the Sharia’ from many angles, this is also the situation with the follower who based upon this previous story, made it incumbent upon the Muslims to be obedient to the shaykh, to the extent one of them said to the people: if you see the shaykh and he is wearing a cross around his neck, then it is not allowed to criticize him!

With all the clarity of the absurdity of these stories, and their opposition together to the Sharia’ and to the intellect, we find some people become deceived by these stories, and amongst them some of the cultured youth. A discussion took place between me and one of those youths about that story, and he had heard it from that follower of the shaykh, and what the shaykh had based his ruling upon. However, the discussion with him did not bring about any benefit. He persisted in believing this story, since according to his claim, it was a miracle, and he added: you people reject miracles!

So when I said to him: If your shaykh orders you to kill your father, would you do it?

He said: Indeed, I have not reached that level yet!

So after this can anyone be blamed for characterizing the religion of these shaykhs except that they are the opium of the people?

The second group is:

The blind followers who prefer to follow the statements of the Madhab above the statement of the Prophet – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam with what is clearly taken from the statements of the Prophet – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam. So if it is said to one of them, for example: do not pray the Sunnah of the Fajr prayer after the obligatory prayer has begun, due to the prohibition of the Prophet – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam – from doing so, which is clear, they do not obey, and they say the Madhab allows this.

If it is said to them: the Nikah at-Tahleel ( whereby another man marries the divorced woman and then divorces so that she can be allowed to marry her first husband) is invalid, because the Prophet – sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam – cursed the one who does this. They would answer by saying: No, but it is permissible according to such and such Madhab!

There are hundreds of issues like this, and this is why many of the scholars held the opinion that the saying of Allaah Tabaraka wa Ta’ala about the Christians: << They took their rabbis and their monks to be their lords besides Allaah >> applies to these blind followers, as Fahkr ar-Razi has explained in his Tafseer.

Posted from: The Ahadeeth of Tawheed, Explained By the Muhaaddith, the Allaamah, Shaykh Naasirud-Deen al-Albaanee (rahimullaah), Source: Silsilah Ahadeeth As-Saheehah of Shaykh Al-Albaani (rahimahullaah), Translated by: Abbas Abu Yahya (hafidhahullaah)