The Attributes of Allah and warning against the
Jahmiyyah
 

Hijrah From
Innovators

From Majmu` al-Fatawa (28/203-210) of Sheikh-ul-Islam Ibn
Taymiyyah
He was asked:

  »   From whom is it obligatory or permissible to show hatred or abandon
for  the sake of Allah The Most High? And,
  »   What are the conditions under which one hates such person or abandons
him for the sake of Allah The Most High? And,
  »   Does the one who leaves prayer fall under this category of 
abandonment or not? And,
  »   When the person who is being shunned gives salaams, is it obligatory
for the one shunning him to return salaams or not? And,
  »   What is the duration of such hatred and shunning for the sake of 
Allah, [is it] as long as one is certain that the attributes which require
hatred and shunning are present, or is there a fixed limit for it? [If so]
then what are its regulations, please explain how it works?

So he answered:

The Hijrah of the Sharee'ah is of two types:

  »   Meaning to leave evil;
  »   With the meaning of punishment for it [evil].

As for the first, it is mentioned in Allah The Most High`s saying,

"When you see those who rush to [mock] Our ayat, stay away from
them until they turn to another subject. And if shaytaan causes you to
forget, then after remembering do not sit in the company of the people who
do wrong."[al-An`am 6:68]

And His The Most High saying,

"And it has been revealed to you in the Book that when you hear
Allah`s ayat being denied and mocked, then do not sit with them until they
turn to a different subject, otherwise you will be like them. Surely Allah
will gather all of the hypocrites and disbelievers in
Hell."[an-Nisa` 4:140]

So these mean that one is not to witness evil [al-munkaraat] without
necessity. Like the people who drink intoxicants or sitting with them, or
people who invite to a feast in which intoxicants or wind instruments are
common. It is not obligatory to accept their invitation or their likes.
The difference is over one who attends them intending only to object to
[such behavior], or by other than his own choice. And for this is the
saying, "One who witnesses evil is like the one who does it" and "the
hadeeth, Whoever believes in Allah and the Last Day, let him not sit at a
table in which khamr is drunk."

This type of Hijrah is that in which one removes himself from doing evil.
As he  said, "The muhaajir is one
who migrates from what Allah has forbidden him from."

This is the topic of migration from the lands of disbelief and 
disobedience to the lands of Islam and faith, a migration from living
among the disbelievers and hypocrites for one who is incapable of doing
what Allah has ordered him to do. As Allah said,

"And stay away from ar-rujz."[al-Mudaththir 
74:5]

The second type is Hijrah with the aim of discipline. It is abandoning the
one who displays evil, abandoning him until he repents from it as the 
Prophet  and the Muslims abandoned
the three who stayed home until Allah revealed that they had repented -
when without an excuse they did not go out for jihad for which they were
called. And Hijrah is not made of one who demonstrates good, even if he is
a hypocrite. So here Hijrah holds the status of  punishment (at-ta`zeer).
And at-ta`zeer is for anyone who abandoned an obligatory duty, or does
what is forbidden, like abandoning obligations such as prayer, zakah, or
establishing oppression and immorality, and inviting to innovation which
contradicts the Book and the Sunnah and the consensus of the Imams of the
Salaf - that which is clearly innovation.

This is the correct saying among sayings of Imams of the Salaf: That is
that testimony is not accepted from those who call to innovation, nor are
they to be prayed behind, nor is knowledge to be taken from them, nor are
they to be married. This is the punishment for them until they refrain.
And here they make a distinction between the one who invites to it and the
one who does not, because the one who invites spreads the evil, so he
deserves the punishment. The case is opposite with the one who is discrete
about it, for he is no more evil than the hypocrites whose outward
appearance the Prophet  accepted,
entrusting their intent with Allah, although he was cognizant of the
condition of many of them. Similar is the hadeeth: "When a sin is hidden,
it harms no one but the one who does it. But if it is publicized, and not
objected to, then everyone is harmed." And that is because the Prophet
 said, "Surely when people see an
evil and do not change it, then Allah is quick to reach them all with a
punishment from Him."

So correcting evil is obligatory when it is apparent, contrary to the 
hidden type. For punishment of it is reserved only for the one who does
it.

Hijrah Differs Depending Upon the Strength or Weakness of the Believer,
the Good that is more Preponderate, and Circumstances of Place and
Time:

This Hijrah differs for the people who perform it depending upon their
strength, their weakness, and their numbers, large or small. The aim of it 
is to scold the one who is abandoned and discipline him and save the
society from a similar outcome. So if the good in doing so is more
preponderate as far as one can ascertain, then Hijrah until the evil is
weakened and diminishes is permissible. But if the one abandoned or others
cannot leave the evil but increase in evil due to the treatment, or the
one abandoning is weak - so much so that it is improbable that the good
will prevail - then Hijrah is not allowed.

Rather, being friendly to some people is more beneficial than shunning
them. And shunning is more beneficial with some people than friendliness.
The Prophet  was friendly with some
people and he abandoned others. As in the case of the three who stayed
home, they were better than many others whom he was friendly with. This is
because those people held the reigns of obedience over their tribesmen. So
the religion derived the most benefit from softening their hearts. And
these people, they were believers, and there were many other believers
like them, so by shunning them, the religion became fortified and this
helped to purify them from  their sins. This is similar to waging war
sometimes and making treaties of peace at others. All of this depends upon
the situation and the good expected. And the answers of the Imams like
Ahmad and others regarding this topic are based upon this principle.

The same distinction occurs between locations in which innovation is
predominate - like the concept of al-Qadariya in Basrah, astrology in
Khurasan, Shi'ism in Koofah - and other areas that do not have these
problems. There is also a distinction between the people of power and
those other than them.

A Warning that Hijrah is not to be performed for personal reasons or
out of revenge:

When this is clear, then the Hijrah of the Sharee'ah is among those deeds
which Allah and His Messenger  
command. So obedience in it must no doubt be sincere for Allah and in
conformity with His command. Then if it is sincere for Allah it is
correct. But, whoever makes Hijrah due to his own desires or he makes a
Hijrah other than what has been commanded, then his Hijrah is not included
here. The more the souls act according to their desire, the more doubt
there is that it is being done out of obedience to Allah.

Now Hijrah for the sake of oneself is not allowed for more than three
days, as is found in the Sahihayn that the Prophet  said, "A Muslim is not allowed to abandon his brother for
more than three days - they meet, and one turns away from the other. The
best of them is he who gives the salaam."

So permission for this Hijrah does not extend beyond three days, just as
permission to marry additional wives does not extend beyond three. In the
Sahihayn (Bukhari and Muslim)the Prophet  is reported to have said, "The gates of paradise are
opened every Monday and Thursday, so all worshippers who did not associate
anything with Allah are forgiven, except for a man whom between he and his
brother is a grudge. It is said, Detain these two until they reconcile."

Such abandoning of ones rights is prohibited, there is only an allowance
for some people, like in the case of the wife, her husband abandoning her
bed when she rebels is like the allowance to abandon for three days.

Here it is necessary to distinguish between the Hijrah which is Allah`s
right, and the Hijrah which is one`s own right. The first of them is
something that is commanded, and the second is something forbidden,
because the believers are brethren. In an authentic hadeeth it is reported
that the Prophet  said,

Do not cut one another off, do not turn away from one another, do not hate
one another, and do not envy one another, be  the brethren of Allah`s
servants, the Muslim is a Muslim`s brother.

In a hadeeth from the Sunan, he  
said, "Shall I not inform you of more virtue than numerous acts of prayer,
fasting, charity and commanding good and forbidding evil? They said, O
Messenger  of Allah yes! He said,
Reconcile enmity, for enmity is the clipper, I do not mean the one that
clips hair, but the one that clips the religion."

In an authentic hadeeth he  said,
"The parable of the believers` love, mercy and kindness with one another
is that of one body. When one of its members  suffers, the rest of  the
body is affected by fever and sleeplessness."

This is so because Hijrah is among the legislated punishments. It is a
type of jihad in Allah`s way. It is done so that Allah`s Word be supreme
and so the entirety of  the religion be for Him. The believer is required
to make enmity for Allah`s sake, and to befriend for Allah`s sake, so much
so that the believer is required to maintain the friendship even if he is
oppressed. For oppression does not sever the allegiance of faith
(al-muwalaat al imaaniyah). Allah The Most High said,

"And if two parties of the believers fight, then try to
bring them to reconciliation. But if one of them rebels against the
other, then fight the one that rebelled until it complies with Allah`s
order. Then make a reconciliation between them with justice, and be
fair, for indeed Allah loves those who are fair. The believers are but
brothers..."[al-Hujuraat: 9-10]

He renders them brothers even while they are fighting and committing
oppression, and He commands reconciliation between them.

So the believer must distinguish between these two types. Which has more
doubt in it than the other? Then know that your allegiance is obligatory
to the believer, even if you are oppressed  or attacked, and your enmity
of the disbeliever is obligatory even if he is beneficent and is good to
you. For Allah glorious is He sent the Messenger  and revealed the Book so that the entirety of the religion
be for Allah, so love is for His allies and enmity for His enemies, honor
is for His allies and disgrace for His enemies, reward is for His allies
and punishment is for His enemies.

Now if both good and evil are present in a man, both sin and obedience,
disobedience, Sunnah, and innovation: He has the right to allegiance and
friendship in proportion to his goodness, and the right to enmity and
punishment according to his evil. So it may be that one personality
possesses what warrants both honor and dishonor, he possesses some of this
and some of that, like the poor thief whose hand is cut off for what he
has stolen but he is given what will satisfy his needs from the storage of
charity.

These are the fundamentals which are agreed upon by Ahl as-Sunnah
wal-Jamaa`ah, whereas the Khawaarij, the Mu'tazilah and those of similar
thinking differ. For them the people are either deserving of absolute
reward or absolute punishment. But Ahl as-Sunnah say: "Allah punishes some
people of major sins in the Fire, then they are taken out of it by means
of the intercession of those whom He permits to intercede by virtue of His
Mercy, as is elaborated upon by the Sunnah of the Prophet ." And Allah - Glorious is He and Most
High - knows best. O Allah make mention of Muhammad  and his family
and his companions.