The Deceased Is Punished by His Family's Weeping over Him

Praise be to Allah

Among the strange statements of this age is that you find a book sold in the lands of the Muslims in which it is written that among the conditions for the authenticity of a hadith’s text is that it “not contradict what has come in the Noble Qur’an of rulings, laws, and attributes of Allah the Exalted and His Messenger.” The book then argues as follows: “We will come to know how these criteria are applied through examples that the noble Companions and the scholars have given us in their dealings with the hadiths. The first criteria are the criteria laid down by our lady and our beloved, and the beloved of our noble Messenger, the Lady ‘A’isha bint Abi Bakr, may Allah be pleased with them both, who was distinguished by intelligence and understanding and by abundant narration. She used to interpret the hadith of the Messenger of Allah, upon him be blessings and peace, while in his presence, and she was keen to understand the meanings of the Book and the Sunnah, and to set the Book against the Sunnah. She would hasten to ask about whatever was not clear to her, and the Messenger of Allah would explain it to her and she would receive the correct understanding from him. With her constant companionship of the Messenger of Allah, his love for her, her young age, and her free time, there grew in her intellectual and scholarly strength and a sound view of the concepts of the religion.”

Then it cited the hadith “The deceased is punished by his family’s weeping over him,” as found in al-Bukhari’s Sahih in two narrations and in Ahmad’s Musnad, and then said: “So the Lady ‘A’isha’s rejection of the text of this hadith came for several reasons: the text of this hadith contradicts the explicit Qur’an, for Allah the Exalted ruled in His Qur’an that every soul has what it has earned, ﴿and no bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another﴾, so a person’s burden does not in any way fall upon another. On the basis of the ruling of Allah the Exalted, it is impossible that the Messenger of Allah, upon him be blessings and peace, would mention a ruling contrary to the word of Allah that he brought.”

I Have Quoted the Words Verbatim to Make Clear Several Matters

The First Matter: Assuming Baseless Rules and Treating Them as Givens

Many of those who raise doubts and promote mistaken ideas resort to a common method: assuming rules that have no scholarly basis, and then dealing with them as though they were established facts and scholarly givens. An example of this is the claim that among the conditions for the authenticity of a text is that it “not contradict what has come in the Noble Qur’an of rulings, laws, and attributes of Allah the Exalted and His Messenger.” Yet we do not find, in the recognised scholarly heritage, anyone who stated this rule, or approved these conditions, or adopted them as a criterion for accepting or rejecting a hadith. And upon verification and inquiry, which of the scholars laid down these conditions? Who supported them and acted upon them? Who made them a binding criterion for accepting narrations? You will not find a documented answer traced back to the scholars of hadith and legal theory, which shows that issuing such rules is easy and simple, without proof or evidence.

Those who hold these doubts, if they are sincere in seeking the truth and in serious scholarly research, ought to reflect on the relationship between the noble Sunnah of the Prophet and the Noble Qur’an, for such reflection and contemplation would remove many of the difficulties that may occur to them. The true Muslim cannot place the Sunnah in conflict with the Qur’an, because both are revelation from Allah the Exalted, issuing from a single niche, and they cannot truly conflict. Nor is it established from any of the scholars of the Ummah that the Sunnah must be measured against the Qur’an as a condition for accepting it. Rather, what is established from contemplating the Noble Qur’an is that Allah the Exalted commanded obedience to His Messenger ﷺ and following him in more than thirty places, affirming that obedience to him ﷺ is obedience to Allah the Exalted, without any indication or proof of an obligation to measure the Sunnah against the Noble Qur’an.

The Second Matter: Using the Method of “Poison in Honey” and Playing on Emotions to Slip Past Fallacies

Some, in dealing with legal and historical issues, use a fallacious method marked by stirring emotion and highlighting the sentimental side of the discourse, so that the idea seems at first glance acceptable and coherent, though it hides within it serious fallacies that may pass without sufficient attention because of this method. An example is that you find a lengthy paragraph whose outward appearance is veneration and praise of a great figure such as the Mother of the Believers ‘A’isha, may Allah be pleased with her and with her father, with a strong display of her virtue, knowledge and standing. This is an undisputed truth; indeed, this praise does not fulfil any part of her due and her standing. Yet in the midst of this praise a phrase may be inserted that raises questions and suspicion, such as the statement that she “was keen to understand the meanings of the Book and the Sunnah, and to set the Book against the Sunnah.” This is an unclear phrase, and it raises two serious scholarly problems:

The first: the lack of clarity in the precise meaning of the term “setting the Book against the Sunnah.” From the context of the text, after analysis and scrutiny, one gathers that what is meant is subjecting the Sunnah of the Prophet to a personal understanding of the Noble Qur’an, an understanding that may be influenced by personal whims, with all that this entails of departure from the method of truth and its controls. In reality, the book under discussion, if its applications are subjected to critical analysis, reveals that this “setting against” is not based on recognised methodological foundations in the principles of exegesis and its established rules, nor does it take account of historical contexts, the occasions of revelation, and the established legal controls; this, while affirming the falsity of the principle on which this claim rests, namely measuring the Sunnah of the Prophet against the Noble Qur’an.

The second: what was said in describing the Mother of the Believers ‘A’isha, may Allah be pleased with her, as keen on this “setting against,” after which the book offered as evidence only three well-known and very limited examples. These are few examples that can never rise to establishing such keenness. Imam al-Dhahabi mentioned in Siyar A’lam al-Nubala’ (2/139) that the Musnad of ‘A’isha, may Allah be pleased with her, reached two thousand two hundred and ten hadiths, of which al-Bukhari and Muslim agreed on one hundred and seventy-four, al-Bukhari alone had fifty-four, and Muslim alone sixty-nine. From this huge total of hadiths we find this alleged method of reasoning in only three places, and they are never sufficient to indicate keenness or the adoption of a fixed method of setting the Sunnah against the Qur’an.

The Third Matter: The Writer’s Claim That His Personal Understanding Reflects the Lawgiver’s Intent, Without Reliance on the Sunnah, the Statements of the Scholars, or the Rules of Legal Theory

On reading the quoted text we find the following phrase: “so a person’s burden does not in any way fall upon another.” This is a phrase that calls for pause and astonishment, for the people of this method claim to venerate the Qur’an, but their defective method leads them to set the texts of the Qur’an against one another. This is the result of the corrupt method they have adopted, based on giving bare reason precedence over the texts of revelation and on slipping free of the controls of the wise Law. In their outward claim they venerate the Qur’an, but in reality they fabricate a conflict between the Qur’an and the Sunnah that will inevitably lead them to setting the Qur’an against the Qur’an, whereas the correct understanding of the Qur’an is achieved only through the Sunnah of the Prophet, which explains it and details it.

In reply to this mistaken claim, we cite the saying of Allah the Exalted:

﴿That they may bear their own burdens in full on the Day of Resurrection and some of the burdens of those whom they misguide without knowledge. Unquestionably, evil is that which they bear.﴾ (al-Nahl 16:25)

Imam Ibn Kathir, may Allah have mercy on him, said in his exegesis of the verse: That is, We decreed for them to say that so that they bear their own burdens and some of the burdens of those who follow them and agree with them; that is, the sin of their own misguidance falls upon them, along with the sin of their leading others astray and those others following their example, as has come in the hadith: “Whoever calls to guidance will have a reward like the rewards of those who follow him, without that diminishing anything from their rewards; and whoever calls to misguidance will bear a sin like the sins of those who follow him, without that diminishing anything from their sins.”¹ And the Exalted said: ﴿But they will surely carry their [own] loads and [other] loads along with their loads, and they will surely be questioned on the Day of Resurrection about what they used to invent.﴾ (al-‘Ankabut 29:13) For this reason al-‘Awfi narrated from Ibn ‘Abbas concerning the verse ﴿That they may bear their own burdens in full on the Day of Resurrection and some of the burdens of those whom they misguide without knowledge﴾ (al-Nahl 16:25) that it is like His saying: ﴿But they will surely carry their [own] loads and [other] loads along with their loads﴾ (al-‘Ankabut 29:13). And Mujahid said: They bear their loads: their own sins and the sins of those who obeyed them, while nothing of the punishment is lightened for those who obeyed them. End quote.

These clear and explicit texts expose the falsity of what the proponents of the method referred to are promoting, and they pose to them a challenge to answer the apparent contradiction they have produced on their own. On the other hand, the method of Ahl al-Sunnah wa al-Jama’ah is based on full submission to the authentic, established Sunnah as revelation from Allah the Exalted; accordingly, the understanding of the Noble Qur’an is consistent and coherent, without contradiction; indeed, the Sunnah of the Prophet clarifies and explains whatever in the Qur’an may be difficult to understand.

In this context, Ibn Kathir said in explaining the saying of the Exalted: ﴿And no bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another﴾ (al-Isra’ 17:15): Allah the Exalted informs that whoever is guided and follows the truth and treads in the footsteps of prophethood, the praiseworthy outcome of that accrues only to himself; ﴿and whoever errs﴾, that is, from the truth, and deviates from the path of right guidance, harms only himself, and the evil consequence of that returns only upon him. Then He said: ﴿And no bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another﴾, that is, no one bears the sin of anyone else, and no wrongdoer harms anyone but himself, as the Exalted said: ﴿And if a heavily laden soul calls [another] to [carry some of] its load, nothing of it will be carried﴾ (Fatir 35:18). There is no contradiction between this and His saying: ﴿But they will surely carry their [own] loads and [other] loads along with their loads﴾ (al-‘Ankabut 29:13), and His saying: ﴿and some of the burdens of those whom they misguide without knowledge﴾ (al-Nahl 16:25), for those who call [to misguidance] bear the sin of their own misguidance, and another sin because of those they misled, without that diminishing anything of the burdens of those others or carrying anything away from them. This is from the justice of Allah and His mercy towards His servants.

As for the Doubt Raised About the Hadith, It Has Been Answered Many Times, and Here Is a Brief Reminder

Al-Bukhari narrated in his Sahih (1290): Isma’il ibn Khalil narrated to us: ‘Ali ibn Mushir narrated to us: Abu Ishaq, who is al-Shaybani, narrated to us, from Abu Burda, from his father, who said: “When ‘Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, was struck, Suhayb began saying: O my brother! ‘Umar said: Do you not know that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: The deceased is punished by the weeping of the living?”

And al-Bukhari narrated in his Sahih (1286): ‘Abdan narrated to us: ‘Abd Allah narrated to us: Ibn Jurayj informed us, saying: ‘Abd Allah ibn ‘Ubayd Allah ibn Abi Mulayka informed me, saying: “A daughter of ‘Uthman, may Allah be pleased with him, died in Makkah, and we came to attend her funeral. Ibn ‘Umar and Ibn ‘Abbas, may Allah be pleased with them, were present, and I was sitting between them, or he said: I sat beside one of them, then the other came and sat beside me. ‘Abd Allah ibn ‘Umar, may Allah be pleased with them both, said to ‘Amr ibn ‘Uthman: Will you not forbid the weeping? For the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: The deceased is punished by his family’s weeping over him. Ibn ‘Abbas, may Allah be pleased with them both, said: ‘Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, used to say something of that. Then he narrated, saying: I returned with ‘Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, from Makkah, until when we were at al-Bayda’, there was a group of riders under the shade of an acacia tree. He said: Go and see who these riders are. I looked, and it was Suhayb, so I informed him. He said: Call him to me. So I went back to Suhayb and said: Set out and join the Commander of the Believers. Then when ‘Umar was struck, Suhayb came in weeping, saying: O my brother! O my companion! ‘Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, said: O Suhayb, do you weep over me, when the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: The deceased is punished by some of his family’s weeping over him? Ibn ‘Abbas, may Allah be pleased with them both, said: When ‘Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, died, I mentioned that to ‘A’isha, may Allah be pleased with her, and she said: May Allah have mercy on ‘Umar. By Allah, the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, did not say that Allah punishes the believer because of his family’s weeping over him; rather the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: Allah increases the disbeliever in punishment because of his family’s weeping over him. And she said: The Qur’an suffices you: ﴿And no bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another﴾. Ibn ‘Abbas, may Allah be pleased with them both, said at that: And it is Allah who makes [one] laugh and weep. Ibn Abi Mulayka said: By Allah, Ibn ‘Umar, may Allah be pleased with them both, said nothing.”

No rational person would ever say that the Mother of the Believers ‘A’isha, may Allah be pleased with her, rejected the narration of ‘Umar ibn al-Khattab, may Allah be pleased with him, because of the apparent meaning of the Qur’an. She rejected the narration on the basis of what she had heard and memorised from the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, and then cited the Qur’an in support of her statement. There is no doubt that striving to give preference to one of two reports because it agrees with the apparent meaning of the Qur’an is not like opposing the Sunnahs and nullifying them by the Qur’an. How far apart is the method of these striving Companions in rejecting these narrations, which do not exceed three, from the method of those who took from the apparent meanings of the Qur’an ambiguous meanings by which they rejected everything that did not agree with their opinions and did not suit their tastes, from among the authentic, unambiguous hadiths whose established status and binding force the people of Islam have agreed upon. They thereby suspended hundreds of hadiths and narrations on various questions of creed and rulings. Indeed, some of them in this age went so far as to call for putting the Sahih collections of hadith on trial on the basis of this sick, collapsing method.

So it is no wonder that you find the following paragraph in the same book: “It is well known that Imam al-Bukhari, who died in 256 AH, chose about 4 thousand hadiths of the Messenger of Allah, upon him be blessings and peace, from about 600 thousand hadiths that he collected in about 16 years. He strove to lay down rules for the soundness of the chain and gathered what he found to have a sound chain, so may Allah reward him with good, him and all the scholars who made great efforts to protect the hadiths of the Messenger of Allah from liars and fabricators. But of course I do not deny that I ignored the hadiths that I did not find to agree with what I know of the sound religion.”

Or that you find in it the following paragraph: “The scholars of hadith, such as al-Bukhari, Muslim, al-Nasa’i, Abu Dawud, Ibn Majah, al-Tirmidhi, the Musnad of Imam Ahmad, al-Tabarani and Ibn Hibban, relied in judging the authenticity of the hadiths they narrate on the soundness of the chain alone. The scholars after them ought to have completed this commendable effort, and researched the criticism of the text, to arrive at the most authentic texts, just as they strove to arrive at the most authentic chains. But unfortunately this did not happen; criticism of the text occurred only very slightly, as passages within some books.” And of course the book made plain the method intended for criticising the text: whim.

In conclusion, Ibn al-Qayyim, may Allah have mercy on him, said in Tahdhib Sunan Abi Dawud, ‘Ata’at al-‘Ilm edition (2/336):

This is one of the hadiths that ‘A’isha rejected and corrected, and in which she attributed an error to Ibn ‘Umar. But what is correct is with Ibn ‘Umar, for he memorised it and did not err in it. His father ‘Umar ibn al-Khattab narrated it from the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and it is in the two Sahihs, and those of the group of Companions who were present with him agreed with him on it, as the two of them reported in the two Sahihs from Ibn ‘Umar, who said: When ‘Umar was stabbed he fainted, and there was crying out over him; when he came to, he said: Do you not know that the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: “The deceased is punished by the weeping of the living”? They also reported from him, from the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, that he said: “The deceased is punished for what is wailed over him.”

They also reported in the two Sahihs from Abu Musa, who said: When ‘Umar was struck, Suhayb began saying: O my brother! ‘Umar said to him: O Suhayb, do you not know that the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: “The deceased is punished by the weeping of the living”? And in a wording of theirs: ‘Umar said: By Allah, I knew that the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: “Whoever is wept over is punished.”

And in the two Sahihs from Anas: that when ‘Umar was stabbed, Hafsa wailed over him, and he said: O Hafsa, did you not hear the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, say: “The one who is wailed over is punished”?

And in the two Sahihs from al-Mughira ibn Shu’ba: I heard the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, say: “Whoever is wailed over is punished for what is wailed over him.”

So these are ‘Umar ibn al-Khattab, his son ‘Abd Allah, his daughter Hafsa, Suhayb, and al-Mughira ibn Shu’ba, all narrating that from the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and it is impossible that all of these erred in the hadith.

And the contradiction that the Mother of the Believers, may Allah be pleased with her, supposed between their narration and His saying: ﴿No bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another﴾ (al-An’am 6:164) does not follow at all. If it did follow, it would also follow in her own narration: “Allah increases the disbeliever in punishment because of his family’s weeping,” for Allah, Glorified is He, does not punish anyone for the sin of another in which he had no part. So whatever answer the Mother of the Believers gives about the case of the disbeliever, her children give the same about the hadith she corrected. They then took several approaches to it:

One of them: that this is specific to one who instructed that he be wailed over, so the wailing over him is because of his own action. This would accord with what was customary among the people of the Jahiliyya, as one of them said:

When I die, announce my death with what I deserve … and tear your collar over me, O daughter of Ma’bad

And this is plentiful in their poetry. As for one who did not cause that, by instruction or otherwise, the hadith does not include him. This is weak from two angles:

First: that the wording is general.

Second: that ‘Umar and the Companions understood from it that this occurs even if he did not instruct it.

And from another angle: instructing that is forbidden and deserves punishment whether he is wailed over or not, whereas the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, linked the punishment to the wailing, not to the instruction.

The second approach: that this is specific to one for whom wailing was his custom and the custom of his people and family, and he knew that they would wail over him when he died. If he did not forbid them, that was his approval of their action, and that is the cause of his punishment. This is al-Bukhari’s approach in his Sahih, for he gave it a chapter heading and said: “If wailing was his practice.” It is close to the first.

The third approach: that the ba’ is not the ba’ of causation but the ba’ of accompaniment, and the meaning is: he is punished along with his family’s weeping over him, that is, his family’s weeping and his punishment coincide, as in saying: Zayd went out with his weapon. The Exalted said: ﴿while they had entered with disbelief, and they have certainly left with it﴾ (al-Ma’idah 5:61).

This approach is certainly false, for not every deceased person is punished, and because this wording indicates nothing but causation, as those of greatest understanding understood it; and that is why ‘A’isha rejected it, when she understood causation from it.

And because the other authentic wording narrated by al-Mughira nullifies this interpretation.

And because informing that the punishment of a deceased person who deserves punishment coincides with his family’s weeping has no benefit.

The fourth approach: that what is meant by the hadith is what the deceased suffers pain and torment from, of the weeping of the living over him; it does not mean that Allah the Exalted punishes him for the weeping of the living over him. For torment is of the kind of pain that afflicts him from those near him who cause him distress and the like. The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: “Travel is a piece of torment.” This is not a punishment for a sin; it is only torment and pain. So when the deceased is rebuked for what is wailed over him, pain and torment from that reach him.

This is indicated by what al-Bukhari narrated in his Sahih from al-Nu’man ibn Bashir, who said: ‘Abd Allah ibn Rawaha fainted, and his sister ‘Amra began weeping: O my mountain! O such-and-such! O such-and-such! enumerating his qualities. When he came to, he said: You did not say anything except that it was said to me: Are you like that?

And the saying of the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, has preceded in the hadith of ‘Abd Allah ibn Thabit: “When it becomes due, let no weeping woman weep.”

This is the soundest of what has been said about the hadith. There is no doubt that the deceased hears the weeping of the living, and hears the tapping of their sandals, and the deeds of their living relatives are presented to them; when they see in them what grieves them, they suffer pain because of it. This and the like are among what the deceased is tormented and pained by, and there is no contradiction in any way between that and the saying of the Exalted: ﴿And no bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another﴾. End quote.

And praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds.

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