Liqa' al-Iman, Meeting of Faith (television programme)

"Liqa' al-Iman" (Meeting of Faith) is a television interview programme of which the Assabile archive keeps twenty-nine video episodes, each roughly eight to thirteen minutes long. The presenter opens every episode by welcoming "the great Islamic preacher" Muhammad Mutawalli al-Sha'rawi, then puts to him a run of questions on law, creed, Qur'anic interpretation, the Prophet ﷺ's life and the affairs of family and society, and al-Sha'rawi answers in Egyptian colloquial Arabic. ^{1 2} In his closing words the presenter describes the programme as a reply to questions raised "in all kinds of dealings and on all kinds of occasions". ^{3 4} In episode 24 he notes that the recording was made two or three days before the start of Ramadan. ⁵

The questions are the presenter's words and serve here as context, not as the shaykh's statements; what is attributed to al-Sha'rawi is his answers alone, and they are his views, attributed to him, not rulings of the museum. Many questions are short and their answers shorter still, so this page gathers the answers that read clearly in the machine transcript and leaves aside what is unclear.

Episode 1, the reproach in Surat 'Abasa; travel and emigration. The presenter asks about the popular saying "we are reading Surat 'Abasa" and its link to the story of Ibn Umm Maktum (Surat 'Abasa). ² Al-Sha'rawi answers that the Prophet burdened himself in his call beyond what God had charged him, out of eagerness for its success, and that God tells him his duty is only to convey. ^{6 7} He says that had God wanted people's faith by force He would have sent them a sign they could not escape, but He wants hearts, not moulds. ^{7 8} He holds that this reproach was not for a failing but for taking on more than was asked, like a father who sees his son stay up till dawn before an exam and tells him he is killing himself: there is a difference between a reproach for the other's good and a reproach for disobedience. ^{9 10} He says the same of the Prophet forbidding himself what God had made lawful for him: "our Lord did not fault Muhammad; our Lord is being merciful to Muhammad". ^{11 12} He then distinguishes "travel for reflection", by which the traveller grows in faith at what he sees of God's creation, from "travel for gain", by which he seeks a living, drawing on the difference in wording between two verses that command people to journey through the earth. ^{13 14} He recounts that he told the United Nations that the Qur'an has a verse that solves their difficulty: that the whole earth was laid down for all creatures, and that the world's problem is "land without men and men without land" because of borders and barriers. ^{15 16} He asks anyone emigrating for a living to weigh two things: bodies, protecting himself against the country's diseases, and religion: if he can keep his faith there without pressure the journey is lawful, otherwise it is forbidden. ^{17 18} He warns those who have daughters, and says that whoever finds weakness in himself must turn back. ^{19 20} The legal material is in emigration.

Episode 2, healing by the Qur'an, zakat on savings, repeated pilgrimage. The presenter asks about the trend of healing by the Qur'an; al-Sha'rawi says that what has a known cause is treated by returning to the causes God has given, and that what lies beyond a person's reach is referred to God's wisdom and accepted. ^{21 22 23 24} He sees incantation and supplication as the entreaty of the desperate, whom God answers, and says that a sick person in distress clings to anything. ^{25 26} On money a young man saves for marriage or a home, he says zakat is due on it as long as it exceeds his basic needs, and that one should not save for a future need while leaving a poor man hungry today. ²⁷ The material is in zakat. On someone who performs the pilgrimage every year, he says that what exceeds the obligation is the owner's free choice, and that the money spent on the pilgrimage benefits many people. ^{28 29 30} On the "tables of the Merciful" (free Ramadan meals) he holds that the point is not the charity alone but that the great sit beside the small and the rich beside the poor at one meal, and that the truly needy may be held back by shame. ^{31 32}

Episode 3, the slander and the acquittal of the innocent. The presenter asks what an innocent person accused can learn from the acquittal of 'A'isha. ³³ The material is on her page.

Episode 4, the "people of the house", unregistered marriage, questions on fasting. Al-Sha'rawi says a house is the place a person withdraws to from the bustle of life, and is only a house if it is safe and needs are met in it. ^{34 35} He notes that the Qur'an uses "people of the house" in two senses: of Ibrahim's wife when she was given the glad tidings of a son, and of the Prophet's wives in Surat al-Ahzab. ^{36 37 38} He holds that the glad tidings came to Ibrahim's wife from the angels so that nobody would accuse her when she gave birth in old age. ³⁹ He then mentions the narration in which the Prophet placed his cloak over Fatima, al-Hasan and al-Husayn and said they were the people of his house. ⁴⁰ The presenter cites Mahmud Shaltut's view that an unregistered ('urfi) marriage fulfils all its pillars, and asks about those who rule it void. ^{40 41} Al-Sha'rawi says that 'urfi means what people recognise, as opposed to the registered; registration exists for civil courts to accept claims and is not a condition of the Sharia; but in modern times 'urfi has become a marriage that is hidden, and a marriage concealed is not valid, since its basis is announcement and festivity so that people know. ^{42 43} If the announcement is there, the marriage is valid. ⁴⁴ The questions on fasting in this episode are in the fast of Ramadan.

Episode 5, jinn and charlatans. The material is in jinn.

Episode 6, the sciences of the universe and the science of the lawful and forbidden; al-Sayyida Nafisa. Al-Sha'rawi divides knowledge in two: knowledge of the universe on which people's interests depend, such as knowing that heat expands bodies so that a key or a nail can be made from iron, and heavenly knowledge that teaches the lawful and the forbidden. ^{45 46 47} He says that the gift of Lordship reaches believer and unbeliever alike and comes before any obligation, while the gift of Godhood is command and prohibition. ^{48 49} He defines civilisation as what gives you the highest return in the least time and with the least effort. ⁵⁰ He holds that life runs on material values from the universe and values from heaven, that the scholar of the Sharia should not intrude into the laboratory nor the scientist into the lawful and forbidden, and cites the hadith on pollinating the date palms. ^{51 52 53} He says you will not find Russian electricity and American electricity, whereas the theoretical sciences differ between ideologies. ⁵⁴ The material is in al-Sayyida Nafisa.

Episode 7, Islamic banks, usury and work. The material is in usury and on the shaykh's page. He goes on to say that farming is what gives the food that keeps life going, and that Islam wanted the Muslim to be independent of others. ^{55 56} He tells the story of a Companion who complained of need, whose goods the Prophet sold for two dirhams, which he calls "the first auction in Islam"; the Prophet told him to buy an axe with one, gather firewood and stay away fifteen days, and when he came back having earned, told him this was better than coming on the Day of Resurrection with the mark of begging on his face. ^{56 57 58} He remarks that the command to leave trade for the Friday prayer singles out selling, because the seller always wants to sell while the buyer may not want to buy. ⁵⁸ He holds that God placed the treasures of the earth below its surface and reveals some of them through a volcano or an earthquake to push people to search. ^{59 60}

Episode 8, the story of Shu'ayb and women going out. Al-Sha'rawi says the fighters in Chechnya may break the fast in Ramadan. ⁶¹ The main material is in Shu'ayb. He then says that the garden in which Adam lived was a training for his task in life, by command and prohibition, and that the warning of toil was addressed to Adam in the singular because labour falls on the man. ^{62 63 64} He holds that the woman is to be provided for because she has a hard task, and that gold and silk were forbidden to men and permitted to her as things particular to her. ^{65 66}

Episode 9, the spirit; whether the dead benefit from others' deeds. The material on the spirit is in the soul and the spirit. On whether the dead benefit from what is gifted to them, al-Sha'rawi mentions the hadith in which a dead person's deeds cease except for three, one of them a righteous child, then says the story of the Cave contains "three caves": the owner of the two gardens, who forgot that acknowledging the Giver is what guards the gift, and Musa with the righteous servant whom God taught secrets He had not taught His messenger. ^{67 68 69 70 71} He explains that holing the ship kept it for its poor owners rather than letting the king seize it, and that the wall was propped up until the two orphans came of age and could take out their treasure; he holds they were twins since they come of age at once, and that their father's righteousness benefited them, so a parent's deed benefits the child. ^{72 73 74 75 76} The story is in al-Khidr.

Episode 10, fasting without prayer, changing wrong, envy. Al-Sha'rawi says prayer is the one pillar that never lapses, so that even a sick person lying down prays by moving his head, and that God imposed it directly, not through an intermediary, as a superior summons in person someone he wants to tell something important. ^{77 78} The material on changing wrong is in commanding right. Of someone who performs the obligations but harms people he says he is rewarded for the one and held to account for the other, because Islam is safety. ^{79 80} The material on envy is in envy.

Episode 11, whether the dead hear, a grave in a mosque, reading non-Muslim books. The material on greeting the dead is in visiting graves. On a father's zakat he says he does not give it to his married daughter but to her husband if he is poor, because a woman's maintenance falls on her husband. ^{81 82} On the number required for the Friday prayer he notes that al-Shafi'i required forty, and says analogy is with Abu Hanifa and that this is the stronger view to him. ⁸³ Of a man who built a mosque and placed a tomb for himself in it he says there is nothing wrong with it, citing the Prophet's tomb in his mosque and the tombs of saints in mosques; he calls the prohibiting view "pedantry", and holds that the hadith cursing those who took the graves of prophets as places of prayer is applied out of place, because a grave is restricted to burial. ^{84 85} He says Muslims pray in the Rawda with the tomb on their left, and argues that the Qur'an relates the words of those who prevailed over the affair of the Sleepers of the Cave that they would raise a place of prayer over them, without rejecting them. ^{85 86} This is a matter on which Sunni scholars differ, and the museum gives his view attributed to him, without a verdict. (needs_source: the views of the Sunni scholars who prohibit it have not yet been gathered in this run.) On reading non-Muslim books he mentions the Prophet's disapproval when he saw 'Umar with a sheet of the Torah, and says reading is permitted for knowledge, research and exposing contradiction; the material is in Isma'il. ^{86 87 88} He lists the forms of change in the earlier scriptures: forgetting, concealment, shifting words from their places, and adding words said to be from God. ⁸⁹

Episode 12, his life. The presenter asks about his life, and al-Sha'rawi tells of his upbringing, schooling, years abroad and ministry; the material is on his page.

Episode 13, desires and hardships, following a school, divorce by allusion. Al-Sha'rawi says that if a Muslim cannot practise his religion in a country, it is forbidden for him to stay there. ^{90 91} He explains the hadith in which the Fire is surrounded by desires and Paradise by what the soul dislikes: desire is the soul's pull towards what pleases it now and harms it later, and Paradise is surrounded by what the soul finds hard, such as charity and pardon, so do not sell the deferred Paradise for the hasty desire. ^{91 92 93} The material on following a school is in madhhab, and on divorce in talaq.

Episode 14, Ayyub and medical treatment, trial, the orphan's property. The material on Ayyub and on trial is in Ayyub. On a brother who raised his young siblings and then claimed what he had spent when the estate was divided, he says that the sound practice is to divide the estate at the death so each takes his share, and for the guardian to manage the orphan's property faithfully. ^{94 95} He holds that God called the property of the incompetent "your property" in the verse forbidding handing their wealth to them because the guardian is answerable for it, until on reaching maturity it is handed over. ^{95 96}

Episode 15, the waiting period, jealousy and proposal, the punishment of the grave. The material on the waiting period is in 'idda. Al-Sha'rawi contrasts a young man prowling round a girl's house, at whom her father is angry, with one who knocks on the door to propose, whom the father welcomes and offers a drink, and holds that the difference is that the second takes her by God's word, so that the lawful cuts off jealousy. ^{97 98 99} On the punishment of the grave he says it belongs to the unseen, for which there is no proof but the report of God and His messenger, and argues from the verse on Pharaoh's people being exposed to the Fire morning and evening before the Hour comes, which can only be in the grave. ^{100 101 102 103}

Episode 16, maturity and marriage, herbal medicine. Al-Sha'rawi holds that a young man who reaches maturity becomes independent, and that maturity means being able to beget one's like, as a watermelon is known to be ripe only when its seed turns black and can grow another melon. ^{104 105 106} Of a father who stops his capable son from marrying until his sisters marry he says this is meddling in what is not his concern, because marriage answers an instinct that, if not given a lawful outlet, turns to wrong, while the father may judge whether the bride's family are good people. ¹⁰⁷ He says the hadith of the black seed is sound and established. ¹⁰⁸ He observes that the kebab seller adds parsley, the fish seller pickled peppers, and whoever eats salted fish eats onion, and that a donkey in the field eats green mint and leaves dry hay by instinct, and sees in this the guidance the Creator placed in His creatures. ^{109 110 111} He says experience leads to a truth, and the truth becomes a constitution people live by. ¹¹² The material is close to prophetic medicine.

Episode 17, the basmala, imported meat, questions between the schools. The material on the basmala is in the basmala. On imported tinned meat he says that once the government sends a representative to witness the slaughter, the matter is its responsibility; that the eater should say God's name if they did not, since God tied the naming to eating; and that fish and cheese spare one doubtful meat. ^{113 114 115} He says there is no backbiting in speaking of the open sinner, since his sin is public. ^{115 116} He holds that a Muslim may not pass on a bottle of wine given to him, because one gives only what one owns and he does not own it. ^{117 118} He says bodily worship such as prayer is not discharged by another's act, unlike financial worship. ¹¹⁸ The material on Abu Hanifa and al-Shafi'i's difference over prohibition through marriage-relation is in madhhab.

Episode 18, paying zakat early, looking, the imam and loudspeakers. Al-Sha'rawi says zakat al-fitr may be paid early in mid-Ramadan with the intention of zakat at the moment of giving, and likewise zakat on wealth. ^{119 120} He cites a pesticide welcomed with fanfare at first and later condemned by its inventors, to say that one should not enter a door unless one knows how to leave by it. ^{121 122} He says the bane of sin is that we call up its pleasure but not its punishment. ¹²³ He holds that the first glance, which falls unintended, is excused, and the second is the one a person seeks. ¹²⁴ He says prayer behind someone who cannot recite the Qur'an properly is not valid, that the best reciter should lead, and that the worshipper may intend to separate and finish alone. ^{125 126} He holds that broadcasting the call to prayer and recitation through loud speakers an hour before dawn harms sleepers and the sick, calls the microphone "the greatest calamity", and recalls the command to listen in silence when the Qur'an is recited. ^{127 128} These are his views, attributed to him.

Episode 19, minarets and the mosque, prayer on a plane. Al-Sha'rawi says the mosques of the first age had no minarets, and the muezzin climbed onto the roof. ^{129 130} He holds it unseemly for a servant's house to rise above God's house, and that a prayer room on the ground floor of a block of flats is not a mosque, since a mosque runs from the earth to the sky, with no dwelling above or below it. ^{131 132 133} He says someone praying on a plane or a ship faces the qibla at the opening takbir and need do nothing more after that. ^{134 135} He allows a guard to leave his prayer to stop a thief, and holds that a worshipper may open the door to a caller he is expecting as long as he takes no more than three steps. ^{136 137 138}

Episode 20, prayer in distress, horse meat, the catalogue. Al-Sha'rawi says that when something weighed on the Prophet he rose to pray, because man is God's handiwork, and any handiwork that breaks down is taken back to its maker. ^{139 140} He holds that eating horse is not forbidden, and that the prohibition was because horses were instruments of war and transport. ^{141 142} On the Prophet's prayer to have his faults washed away he says that anyone who knows his Lord's station finds his obedience falls short of his Lord's generosity to him. ^{143 144} He explains that a maker sets the purpose of his product before making it and gives it a "catalogue" by which it is run and repaired when it breaks down; since God is man's Creator, man should be referred to his Maker's way. ^{145 146 147} He permits artificial insemination between husband and wife. ¹⁴⁷ He holds that a father's tenderness for his child comes from its being part of him, so that you find no child abandoned in the street unless his parentage was doubted. ¹⁴⁸

Episode 21, the breadth of Paradise, the legal profession, praying behind a sinner, belief in the hereafter. Al-Sha'rawi says God mentioned the breadth of Paradise, and breadth is the lesser of two dimensions, so if the lesser is the heavens and the earth, what of its length? ^{149 150} He holds that practising law is not forbidden unless the lawyer upsets the scale of justice and tries to excuse the crime. ¹⁵¹ He says a son helps his poor father, even one who spends money on drugs, by feeding him and giving him drink by his own hand, keeping kind company with him in this world without obeying him in sin. ¹⁵² A wife may help her poor mother from her own salary. ¹⁵³ He holds prayer behind a sinner permissible to avoid discord, and that whoever cannot bear it may pray the noon prayer at home. ^{154 155} The material on donations to the Ramadan tables is in zakat. Of someone who denies life after death he says faith is in God, His angels and the Last Day, and that whoever denies the Last Day pulls down religion from its foundation. ¹⁵⁶ He argues by reason: the revolution in Russia in 1917 rose against feudalism because it was oppression; if human principle holds that the oppressor must not go unpunished, there must be another day on which the oppressors not caught in this world are taken to account. ^{157 158}

Episode 22, reading al-Kahf on Friday, the late-comer, inheritance. Al-Sha'rawi says the innovation is not in reading Surat al-Kahf before the Friday prayer but in holding the whole mosque to listen to the reader when the worshipper wants to pray. ^{159 160} He objects to those who recite remembrance aloud after the imam's closing salutation and disturb the late-comer completing his prayer. ¹⁶¹ The material on inheritance is in inheritance. On Ramadan being tied to food and late nights he cites the hadith in which God has no need of the faster leaving his food and drink if he does not leave falsehood and acting on it. ^{162 163}

Episode 23, the ritually impure and the mosque, the cost of marriage, a pledge with a Jew. Al-Sha'rawi says one in a state of major impurity enters the mosque only to pass through if his way runs through it. ¹⁶⁴ He criticises young men who want a flat, a car and reception rooms before marrying, before they even have a job. ^{165 166} He holds there is no relationship between a young man and woman before the contract that pleases God, and that a suitor may see her with her close relatives to form an idea of her looks. ^{167 168} The material on visiting graves is in visiting graves. On the Prophet pledging his armour with a Jew he says that had he pledged it with a Muslim, the Muslim might have been too shy to remind him of the debt. ^{169 170} He distinguishes the Qur'an from the hadith qudsi: both are God's speech, but the Qur'an carries the challenge and is recited in prayer, and the hadith qudsi is neither; the material is in hadith qudsi. ¹⁷¹ Asked about the angels descending at Badr, he says the words of the verses are plain and need no interpretation. ¹⁷²

Episode 24, taxes and zakat, the moon sighting and differing horizons, seeking guidance. The material on taxes is in zakat. On Muslim countries differing over sighting the new moon he says each place has its own valid time, just as Alexandria prays the sunset prayer a few minutes after Cairo. ^{5 173 174} He sees wisdom in this: God spread time out, so that at every moment some people pray the sunset prayer, others the afternoon, night or dawn prayer, and God is worshipped at every time in every time. ^{175 176} Of the hadith in which God stretches out His hand by night and by day, he says night and day are always present somewhere on earth, so God's hand is always outstretched. ¹⁷⁷ On medicines containing pig derivatives, or wine claimed to help the heart, he cites the hadith that God did not place the cure of the community in what He forbade it, and says there is no necessity in such cases. ^{178 179} The material on seeking guidance is in istikhara.

Episode 25, the festival prayer in the open, commanding right, plotting. Al-Sha'rawi says the festival prayer has two parts: the prayer, and witnessing the good and the gathering of Muslims, so that even a menstruating woman who does not enter the mosque comes out for it; that is why it needed a place in the open, and there is no reason to hold it in the open if women do not come out. ^{180 181 182} The material on commanding right is in commanding right, and on zakat on household goods in zakat. He explains makr (plotting) as derived from the "mamkura" tree whose branches twist together so that you cannot tell which bough is which: it is the concealing of something by which you mean to harm another. ^{183 184} He says human plotting is limited by human ability and may be uncovered, while no one can uncover God's plan, and that there is good plotting too, concealing things to draw people to good, since God qualified plotting as evil. ^{185 186 187}

Episode 26, dreams, the Qur'an and the impure, zakat on jewellery, al-Hasan. Al-Sha'rawi says a true dream may come to someone other than prophets and saints, like the king of Egypt's dream of the seven cows, and that its truth served to establish the honour of its interpreter, Yusuf. ^{188 189 190} He holds there is nothing wrong with a person in major impurity carrying a radio reciting the Qur'an, because the verse restricting touch of the hidden Book to the purified concerns the angels, though scholars extended it to the written copy as a precaution, so that it is not treated like any other book. ^{191 192} On a woman's jewellery he says that what she acquired as savings is subject to zakat, and what she acquired for adornment is not. ^{193 194} On al-Hasan ibn 'Ali giving up the caliphate he holds it an honour the Prophet bestowed on him in saying that God would reconcile two groups of Muslims through him, so how should he shed that distinction? ¹⁹⁵ The material on the Qur'an's ever-renewed gift is in scientific miracle.

Episode 27, the dotting of the Qur'an, moving graves, supplication, the revelation of the Qur'an. Al-Sha'rawi says the dotting and vowelling of the Qur'an came in the Umayyad state, and that the Arab read without dots by native skill, the context giving the word its meaning, and when that skill decayed clarification was needed. ^{196 197 198} The material on moving graves is in visiting graves. On the hadith that makes keeping ties of kinship a cause of long life he says long life may mean time stretching to hold more events, and that God knew from eternity that His servant would keep his ties and his life be lengthened, so the lengthening itself is decreed. ^{199 200} The material on supplication is in du'a, and on the revelation of the Qur'an in descent.

Episode 28, fasting in Surat al-Baqara, the Night of Power, the tarawih prayer. The material on the legislation of fasting is in the fast of Ramadan, and on the Night of Power in keeping the Night of Power. Al-Sha'rawi says the tarawih prayer is a sunna, originally prayed at home, but 'Umar gathered people for it in the mosque so that they would watch over one another. ^{201 202} On women going to mosques he says they are not barred, and that a woman's prayer at home is better for her. ²⁰²

Episode 29, provision and brokerage, insurance, near-death experiences. Al-Sha'rawi says God provides for the bird but does not drop its food into its nest; it goes out in the morning and returns in the evening. ^{203 204} He holds that Muslims deal with rules set by the Creator, not with economic variables, and that a broker's commission is lawful because he brings buyer and seller together, so he has done work. ^{204 205} He says he asked insurance companies to give the insured some work rather than take money for nothing, and describes a cooperative insurance in which members of a trade join together and all bear the loss of whoever loses. ^{206 207} He says it is the earth that rises to the level of heaven, not heaven that comes down to the level of the earth, so the law is not adjusted to circumstance. ²⁰⁸ Of a book about people said to have died and come back he says they did not die, that what was called death was clinical death, and calls their all saying they went to Paradise "a ruse". ^{209 210 211} He says there is no state between life and death: once the soul reaches the throat a person does not return, and his sight that day is sharp and sees what he did not see before. ^{211 212}

This page leaves aside answers touching sensitive questions where medicine and law overlap and which need more than one cited voice, so they were not written in this run, and leaves the passages where the machine transcript is garbled or looping. They are recorded in the lane's progress file.