LAWS IN SHARI’AH FOR THE PRAYERLESS (DISBELIEVER)

QUESTION:

What should a man do, if he orders his family to pray, but they do not listen to him? Should he live with them and mix with them, or leave the house?

ANSWER: 

If the members of the family do not pray at all, then they are disbelievers, apostates, outside the fold of Islam, and it is not permissible to live with them. But it is an obligation upon him to preach to them and implore them repeatedly, in the hope that Allah may guide them, because the one that abandons the prayer is a disbeliever – may  Allah protect us. The evidence for this is to be found in the Qur’an and Sunnah, the sayings of the Companions ( عنه الله رضي) , and the correct view (of the scholars).

In Qur’an, Allah, The Most High, said:

“But if they repent, perform As- Salah and give Zakat, then they are your brothers in religion.”[At-Tawbah : 11]

As the evidence from the verse, If they repent but do not pray and pay Zakat then a brotherhood is not established between us. And if they establish the prayer but do not pay Zakat, then there is no brotherhood between us. And brotherhood in the religion cannot be nullified except when a person leaves the religion altogether. It is not nullified due to mere disobedience and the lesser disbelief.

According to the ahadith, The Messenger  (ﷺ) said:

“Between a man and between polytheism and disbelief is abandoning the prayer.”  [Sahih Muslim]

Reported in the Book of Faith on the authority of Jabir ( عنه الله رضي) from the Prophet ( ﷺ).

 On the authority of Buraidah Bin Al Husayb ( عنه الله رضي) who said that The Messenger of Allah (ﷺ ) said:

“The convenant between us and between them (the Mushrikun) is the prayer, so whoever abandons it has disbelieved.” [Abu Dawood ][Tirmidhi] [Musnad Ahmed] 

What is meant by disbelief here is the disbelief which takes one out of the religion. This is because the Prophet (ﷺ) made the prayer the thing that sets apart the believers and the disbelievers, and it is known that the millah (religion) of disbelief is different from the millah of the Islam. So, whoever does not fulfill this covenant, then they are from disbelievers.   

Umar Bin Al Khattab ( عنه الله رضي) said, “There is no share in Islam for one who abandons the prayer.”

[Al-Muwatta Imam Maalik]

Hazrat Abdullah Bin Shafiq رضي الله عنه   said:“The companions of the Prophet (ﷺ) did not hold the abandoning of any action to be disbelief except the (abandoning of) prayer.”[At-Tirmidhi]

Its common sense, that if a man has a mustard seed size faith in his heart, he has awareness of importance of prayer, also he is aware of how much Allah s.w.t emphasized about it, then how its possible that a man can be a prayer-less after all of these knowledge. Its impossible!

 So if its said, what do those who do not regard the abandoning of the prayer as disbelief respond with from evidence? We say that the answer is that these evidences do not show that the one who abandons the prayer has not disbelieved  or that such a one is a believer. There evidence are based on four categories:

• Hadith that are weak/unauthentic.

• Evidence which is not based on this issue.

• Based on the condition where the one who is abandoning the prayer is disabled.

• General texts that are particularized by the hadith that are  evidence.

So when their disbelief is established with evidences that are safe  from those who oppose them, it warrants the implications of the rulings of disbelief and  apostasy upon them. It is (therefore) necessary that we know the causes of the rulings, when they applied and when they don’t.

THE PROHIBITION OF MARRIAGE TO A MUSLIM WOMAN:

   About the emigrant women, Allah s.w.t said:“O you who have believed, when the believing women come to you as emigrants, examine them. Allah is most knowing as to their faith. And if you know them to be believers, then do not return them to the disbelievers ; they are not lawful [wives] for them, nor are they lawful [husbands] for them.”[Mumtahanah: 10]

So it is made clear that marrying an apostate is not correct for a Muslim, whether a woman or a man and that this is what is necessitated by the evidence of the Book and the Sunnah.

IF A MAN BECAME DISBELIEVER AFTER MARRIAGE, THEN THEIR NIKKAH WILL BE CANCELLED:

It is made clear that the one who abandons the prayer is a disbeliever by what is necessitated by the evidence of the Book, the Sunnah and the sayings of the generality of tha Sahabah  ( عنه الله رضي), then it is clarified that a man when he does not pray, if he is married to a Muslim woman, his marriage is not correct. And the woman is not permissible for him in this contract. Its evidence is given above. And if he repents to Allah, The Most High and returns to Islam, then it is obligatory for him to make a new (marriage) contract. And the ruling is the same if it is the woman who does not pray.

THE PROHIBITION OF EATING WHAT IS COOKED OF THEIR ANIMALS AND CATTLE:

It is a condition that the one who slaughters the cattle is  a Muslim, Jew or Christian. Then as for the apostate, idol worshipper, magician and their like, then what they slaughter is not permissible. 

THE PROHIBITION OF ENTERING MAKKAH AND ITS SANCTUARIES:

Allah, The Most High, said:“O you who have believed, indeed the polytheists are unclean, so let them not approach Al-Masjid Al- Haram after this, their [ final ] year’.”[At-Tawbah: 28]

THE CESSATION OF INHERITANCEFROM ONE’S NEAR RELATIVES:

This is because a disbeliever does not inherit from a Muslim and a Muslim does not inherit from a disbeliever. This is due to the hadith of Usamah Bin Zayd ( عنه الله رضي) that the Prophet (ﷺ) said:“ A Muslim does not inherit from a disbeliever and a disbeliever does not inherit from a Muslim.”[ Sahih Bukhari] [Sahih Muslim]

On the authority of Ibn E Abbas ( عنه الله رضي), Prophet (ﷺ) said:“ Give the share to those who are entitled to them, and what remains over goes to the nearest male heir.”[Sahih Muslim]

THE PROHOBITION OF PRAYER OVER THEM AFTER THEIR DEATH AND THE PROHIBITION OF MAKING SUPPLICATION FOR THEM FOR THEIR FORGIVENESS FOR ALLAH TO HAVE MERCY ON THEM:

Due to the saying of Most High:

“And do not pray over any of them who has died – ever – or stand at his grave. Indeed, they disbelieved in Allah and his Messenger and died while they were defiantly disobedient’.”[At- Tawbah: 84]

It is not permissible in Islam to give ghusl, Shroud (kafan) or offer Janazah of a disbeliever, even It is also not permissible to buried him in a Muslim graveyard. Now the question is that, what we should do with the deadbody? It’s answer is to bury him by digging an excavation in a desert in his own clothes.

RESURRECTION WITH FIRAO’UN, HAMAAN, QAROON AND ABAYI’ BIN KHALAF ON THE DAY OF JUDGEMENT:

Allah s.w.t said:“It’s not for the Prophet and those who have believed to ask forgiveness for the polytheists,  even if they were relatives, after it has become clear to them that they are companions of Hellfire. And the request of Abraham for his father was only because of a promise he had made to him. But when it became apparent to Abraham that his father was an enemy to Allah, he disassociated himself from him. Indeed was Abraham compassionate and patient.”[At-Tawbah: 113-114]

A man’s making dua for forgiveness and asking Allah’s mercy for anyone who died on disbelief, whatever the reason for their disbelief, is a wrongful violation in Ad-Du’a (supplication) and is a type of ridiculing Allah.

Here we conclude with what we desired to mention in this serous issue, which many from the people have been put to trial with. 

I ask Allah s.w.t that He guides us in our affairs and that He guides us all together on the straight path, the path of those upon whom He has bestowed His favors, from the Prophets, the truthful, the martyrs and the righteous, not the path of those with whom He is angry nor of those who go astray.

REFERENCE:

BOOK: THE RULLING ON ABANDONING THE PRAYER

BY: SHEIKH MUHAMMAD IBN SALIH AL-UTHAYMEEN(رحمه الله)