The Prohibition of Reviling the Companions, and the Excellence of Mu'awiyah ibn Abi Sufyanالنهي عن سب الصحابة وفضل معاوية بن أبي سفيان رضي الله عنه

Allah, exalted is He, says, "And those who came before them in faith, and the emigrants, and those who followed them in righteousness — Allah is pleased with them, and they are pleased with Him." Are you a people whom Allah is pleased with, yet you are not pleased with them? A people whom Allah loves, yet you do not love them? A people whom Allah commanded to be loyal to, yet you do not show them loyalty? Allah, exalted is He, says, "Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and those with him are severe against the disbelievers, merciful among themselves. You see them bowing and prostrating, seeking bounty from Allah and His pleasure. Their mark is on their faces, from the trace of prostration. That is their likeness in the Torah; and their likeness in the Gospel is as a seed which sends forth its shoot, then strengthens it, so it grows thick and stands straight upon its stem, delighting the sowers, that He may enrage the disbelievers through them." Imam Malik drew from this verse that the Rafidah have no share in the spoils of war (ghanimah and fay'), and other scholars drew from it that the Rafidah are disbelievers, since Allah said "that He may enrage the disbelievers through them" — and they are the ones who hate the Companions, curse them, revile them, and declare them disbelievers, and who accuse 'A'ishah of adultery after Allah had already declared her innocent — this being an explicit denial of the Qur'an.

Allah, exalted is He, says, "Not equal among you are those who spent and fought before the victory [of Makkah, i.e. the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah] — such are greater in rank than those who spent and fought afterward — though Allah has promised the best reward [Paradise] to both." And in the Sahihayn is the hadith of Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, that the Prophet ﷺ said, "Do not revile my Companions; do not revile my Companions." The particle "la" here is prohibitive, and the prohibition indicates unlawfulness — reviling the Companions is graver than reviling anyone else. At times reviling a Companion may amount to disbelief, as with those who said, "We have never seen the like of these reciters of ours among us — greedier of belly, more cowardly in battle, and more lying in speech," concerning whom Allah revealed a statement of their disbelief and apostasy: "Was it Allah, and His verses, and His Messenger that you were mocking? Make no excuse; you have disbelieved after your belief." So none mocks or hates the Companions except one who hates the Book and the Sunnah, and hates the leading figures of this religion and its supporters. To then claim that they were traitors or apostates implies that the Prophet ﷺ kept the company of, and did not understand or perceive, people who were mostly base and wicked — a monstrous claim, indeed a lie, for the Prophet ﷺ said, "Do not revile my Companions, for by the One in Whose Hand is my soul, were one of you to spend the equivalent of Mount Uhud in gold, it would not reach a mudd given by one of them, nor half of it" — meaning that were a person to spend the equivalent of the whole world, it would not equal what they spent, out of their great virtue, honor, and status.

There are those today who claim to follow the Sunnah, yet lie and speak ill of Mu'awiyah, may Allah be pleased with him — Mu'awiyah, the Commander of the Believers and their maternal uncle (khal al-mu'minin), being the brother of the Prophet's ﷺ wife, and who, as Ibn Taymiyyah said, is by consensus the best of the kings of the earth. Al-Bukhari related concerning him, quoting Ibn 'Abbas, that he had kept the company of the Prophet ﷺ, and described him as a jurist (faqih); he was one of the scribes of revelation, trusted by the Prophet ﷺ, and 'Umar — who is sufficient testimony to discernment and insight in men — appointed him governor of Syria, as did 'Uthman after him. The scholars are agreed on his excellence, the greatness of his standing, and his lofty rank. That some people seek out an occasional slip or fault does not diminish the man's standing — who among us is free of any fault at all? It is enough disgrace for a woman that her faults can be counted; and one who impugns Mu'awiyah does not himself measure up to his sandal — from head to foot he is drowning in misguidance and deviance. It is deviance enough to speak against Mu'awiyah: a man who kept the company of the Prophet ﷺ, and who is reported to have struggled in Allah's cause alongside him — he went out with the Prophet ﷺ to Hunayn and to Tabuk, he fought alongside Abu Bakr against the apostates, he fought alongside 'Umar, and achieved many conquests, being the one who conquered Cyprus in his own era — great conquest and struggle in support of this religion. It is therefore obligatory upon a person to restrain his tongue from speaking against the Companions, and likewise against the people of knowledge who act upon their knowledge; one should instead be wary of the callers to innovation, the people of misguidance and deviance, who mislead the servants of Allah and confuse people in their religion — those of whom Allah says, "Them does Allah curse, and the cursers curse." As for the sincere scholars, whoever speaks of them otherwise than well has strayed from the path.

النص العربي الأصلي