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Accepting An Unintended Worldly Benefit For Worship
my question is that if for example a person prays namaz so that some elder would give him some pocket money for it then it’s a sort of shirk behavior. but if a person who does not pray for money at all and prays for Allah only, is presented with a gift of money because an elder noticed his prayer and wants to give him a pocket money for his beautiful prayer. that person was unaware of the elder noticing him, hence his intention was purely to be done for Allah. now can he accept the present of pocket money from the elder? if the elder gives him? and he neither intended it during prayer and neither demanded it after, for prayer. so can he accept the gift of pocket money?
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21 Replies
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Accepting An Unintended Worldly Benefit For Worship
updated 5 days, 21 hours ago
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21
Replies
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Yes because this act is not against God, not intention to make it a rival to God.
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@Irfan76 sir there’s a hadith which goes like this
Hadith No: 2157
Narrated/Authority of Ubadah bin Samit
“I taught people from Ahtus-Suffah” Qur’an and how to write, and one of them gave me a bow. I said: ‘It is not money, and I can shoot (with it) for the sake of Allah., I asked the Messenger of Allah (saw) about it and he said: ‘If it would please you to have a necklace of fire placed around your neck, then accept it.'”
here it seems that the man who was teaching the Quran at first was doing it for Allah, but then when he was presented with a gift. then such a warning was given. so how to look into this?
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This has already been explained in the following thread:
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@UmerQureshi brother can you please tell me about this hadith?
Hadith No: 2158
Narrated/Authority of Ubayy bin Kab
“I taught a man the Qur’an, and he gave me a bow. I mentioned that to the Messenger of Allah (saw) and he said: ‘If you accept it you will be accepting a bow of fire.’ So I returned it.”
the previous one was narrated by ubaadah ibn sabit and this one is narrated by ubay bin kab and there’s also another similar one about said to be narrated by Abu dardaa’ and is written in this website :
Is it permissible to pay someone to teach the Qur’aan? Dr Saleh as Saleh
so brother can you tell about the hadith of both Abu dardaa’ and ubay bin kab? are they talking about same hadith mentioned in ubaday bin samit narration? because in these 2 narration the mention of ahl us suffah is not there, so in those 2 ahadith the possibility of explanation being poverty of ahl us suffah is eliminated in those 2 hadith. so just can you tell about the strength and also that are these ahadith about same incident of ahl us suffah? or different incident, one happening with ahl us suffah and one happening with someone else
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We follow a holistic approach where we understand hadith in the light of Quran and Sunnah. Extracting principles from isolated hadith narrations is not a very sound approach becasue of inherent limitations in hadith transmission. I think the following viewpoint of scholars is more relavent in today’s time since it deals with the ethical issue that may arise because of Quran teaching:
“If it is just another Muslim among a group of many who are doing it, it is permissible for him to take the fee for him because he is not obligated to do so in these circumstances. But if he is in a state or place where no one else does that, then it is not permissible for him to take the fee“.
Secondly, if someone is teaching Quran on a daily basis at a fixed time then payment is for that fixed time, not for teaching Quran solely and we know that Sahaba did not use to teach this way.
Lastly, the role of Sahaba was very different as compared to other common Muslims. Since it was their job to propagate and disseminate Quran to the direct addressees of the Prophet Muhammad (sws) therefore, it is understandable if Prophet(sws) had shown a lot of sensitivity when he came to know of this financial benefit taken by one of his companions.
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@UmerQureshi brother thank you for this. i wanted to ask that as you said that if someone is teaching in daily basis then it’s no problem because it’s taking money for the time. my question is that if asking payment for teaching Quran is permissible then, what’s wrong if someone who does not teach on daily basis, rather he charged for a single session where he before starting session told the person that I’ll be taking this money for this session etc.
if the person was teaching Quran out of sake of ibadah and then asking for payment in turn for his ibadah, then it would be understandably wrong (example someone saying that pay me such money because i taught Quran to please Allah). but if he isn’t teaching it out of ibadah or fulfilling a responsibility from Allah, but is just teaching as we teach any other book of science for example. so whether he takes money because of coming to daily basis. or he takes money for teaching Quran even if he isn’t a regular teacher and someone asked him for an isolated session etc, so what’s wrong in it?
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Even if it is one session, one can still take payment for their time. The point is that it can only become objectionable when there is some ethical problem in such arrangement. For example, asking for a payment afterward when initially it was being taught gratuitously. Another example would be to exploit people in making payments because of shortage of teachers or despite people being financially poor to afford such payments. These are some ethical issues which will make receipt of such payments objectionable in some instances and prohibited in some. It is academically more sound approach to assume that prophet Muhammad (sws) also saw some ethical problems in such transactions which made him dislike taking of such payments, because in order to declare something prohibited, we need explicit statement to this effect from Quran and Sunnah.
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@UmerQureshi brother i understand, i was just thinking that what if it in some angle probably or maybe relate with RiyaKari or doing something exclusively for Allah but for something else, i was just asking in the same context that would it fall here or not?
secondly brother, why is it said that money is for the time but not for teaching Quran? i mean if someone normally says I’m taking payment for teaching Quran, then would it be objectionable?
i mean just like some science teacher, we say takes money for teaching science and maths teacher takes money for teaching maths. we don’t usually say they take money for their time to teach science or for time to teach maths. then why while mentioning a teacher of Quran we say payment is for the time of teaching Quran.
Unless brother, you use the same words for science and maths teacher, that the science and maths teacher also take money for the time of teaching, then i would understand that this is just a mere difference of word while explanation but the reality is same. so no problem.
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This is a matter of linguistics with due regard given to education in general.
It is not considered appropriate even in today’s time to say that a teacher is taking payment for a particular subject and actually mean it literally; whenever such a statement is made, it is always implied and understood that the payment is for the contactual time of the teacher because teaching is so noble of a profession to actually claim that someone is taking money for teaching solely. Same goes for Quran, there is nothing wrong in saying that a person is taking payment for teaching Quran but taking it in a literal sense would be considered inappropriate just like other subjects and because of religious sentiments, it adds an emotional perspective to it as well.
I do not think Riyakari would fit into this equation because it is an internal feeling and rarely manifests itself into external actions which are clearly discernible, therefore it is hard to guess whether someone is doing Riyakari or not under pretext of religous actions; and that is why it needs to be addressed by the person himself intrinsically.
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@UmerQureshi sir but if for example someone who teaches maths, and says that I’ll only teach maths if such and such payment is done. and then they say that i take money for teaching maths, literally and also says he means it. so what would be Haram in it? would be just a little bit inappropriate in the sense of feeling? or haram and shirk?
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it is in this way. that for example a restaurant owner, who charges money to prepare and present food to people for feeding. But if my friend for example comes to my house and i say to him that I’ll only present food in front of you, if you pay me such money. now here actually it’s the same thing of charging someone money to present and cook food for them. but here because he’s our friend, so demanding money seems inappropriate because the bond of friendship is above and beyond taking payment and it should not be ruined by asking for payment rather nurtured further with doing things out of love etc.
is the latter explanation right?
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I think we should keep it simple.
A person who is teaching the other person is taking payment because he locked his time for this commitment therefore, he is being paid for his time which would otherwise be spent on some other income earning activity. Same is the case for religious education or an imam appointed in a mosque, the payment being made to them is of their commitment of time which they were not otherwise obligated to commit. A teacher can demand payment on the basis of this principle and this would be fair and within ethical bounds.
But if someone uses his religious education with the intention of solely making worldly gains which involves sacrificing religious principles at times to make that wordly gain, then that kind of financial gain and religious knowledge would be of no use to that person and may infact make him a sinner in the eyes of God.
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@UmerQureshi here’s the hadith mentioned as of being Abu dardaa”s hadith
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@Irfan76 @UmerQureshi sir as it is said that while teaching the Quran, a person that takes payment is for his fixed time and not for teaching Quran, but why is it said like this? if it is said that he is paid because he helped that man gain the knowledge of Quran that’s why he’s taking it, what would be wrong in it? just like we say that a mechanic gets his payment for fixing the bike, not for his presence at the shop. if a person simply receives a payment for his service of teaching the Quran and helping someone gain knowledge of Quran, what thing would be wrong in it?
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Ahadith have not been narrated in their full context. Therefore we do not extract principles from them, rather we try to understand them if they comply with the principles already drawn from the Quran and our sense of morality. If they do, they are accepted, if not, we try to find a reason to remove the apparent contradiction. If we cannot find a suitable interpretation, the narration is rejected on the ground that it is misreporting or an exception for the reason known or unknown.
In the above hadith, we can say the professional services had not started yet, and the prophet might have not been pleased to let his companions get any worldly advantage for their religious services at his point.
Whatever the case is the principle is not sacrificed for individual reporting.
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@Irfan76 okay sir but sir the explanation you mentioned that prophet might not would have been pleased with him taking a worldly benefit for worldly service, but sir this explanation also feels not suitable, because sir even if it was a religious service and hence a religious deed, the man himself did not intended to demand or wanted that bow as a payment for it. but he was himself presented as a gift automatically and he just wanted to accept it etc.
now if not demanded but still a worldly benefit comes and a person accepts the present, then it should not have an effect on reward of deed hence maybe nothing wrong in it, as you explained but then prophet would disallowed it , and would have allowed it. and secondly not only just disallow but a warning of hell was also given etc.
one of the explanation shown by sir Umer, that was comparatively more better intellectually was that, people of ahl us suffah were extremely extremely poor and had almost zero. so one of them gave a bow in return for Quran so prophet did not wanted the companion to take any sort of gift from them because of financial crisis. just as someone morally sound would not like an extremely poor person with just a bunch of goats as property to cut a goat for him in dinner as mehman nawaazi. so maybe there’s a possibility that the person from ahl us suffah felt morally embarrassed that he’s learning from that companion but is not giving anything in return and so in return he gave a bow by himself to get over with embarrassment in his mind etc
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@UmerQureshi sir firstly, as you said in the 3rd paragraph that if someone uses religious knowledge for worldly purpose only, then it would be sin. i wanted to ask that what type of sin would it be? will it fall under shirk? or will it fall under not using a big blessing of Allah, to be close to him but only for worldly purpose (similarly to a person who spends his whole money on worldly things but nothing towards Allah, hence one of the big blessings to be close to him was never used to be close to him)
secondly sir, but if the knowledge that is used for worldly gains only, is just for example knowledge of mathematics. i gain it only for worldly purpose, i teach it only for worldly reason. so my total relation with such worldly knowledge of mathematics was to gain in this world. would such thing be sinful?
and sir lastly, i just wanted to understand that if someone for example teaches WORLDLY KNOWLEDGE ( not religious) like mathematics to someone, and if he says literally and also means it when he says that “i am charging you money, for whatever knowledge you gained from me. for whatever i teach you” and if he doesn’t mean that he is charging money for his time and efforts etc. as you said that this would be inappropriate to mean like this, but i wanted to know that, would such notion just be inappropriate only, or it would be sinful? and if sinful then in what category will it fall into of 5 sin category
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One thing is religion and religious duties of a Muslim (like obligatory ibadah or performing duties like advising others under amr-bil-maruf directive): No financial compensation should be taken for these acts and taking any compensation would be violation of the rights of Allah that are upon us as a Muslim and in some circumstances could also be equivalent to one of the polytheistic attitudes like Rayakari or blind love for this world etc.
The other thing is religous knowledge or other religious responsibility assumed or any other Worldly Knowledge (like being a teacher or being an imam of a mosque): Here compensation can be asked and should be paid because of the contractual commitment of the time of the person. However, if someone makes worldly gains their top priority then it is possible that in such circumstances above mentioned violations can also happen in this category.
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@UmerQureshi yes sir the last thing that you said that top priority of world gain. would eventually lead a person to not be mindful of god’s boundaries and he won’t even think much before violating boundaries to get that benefit. which at sometimes prompt him to do relatively smaller violations to get benefit (like selling by lying decieving) but also bigger violations as to do worship for show off to gain benefit. please tell me if i am understanding this right, as to what you meant in the last part of this answer.
but sir i was just confused that if some friend just for example comes to me to teach him for example maths. now i wasn’t feeling like teaching him much normally. but because he is my friend, and i don’t want him to be angry to me ( i want his pleasure with me) so i decided to give him a few lessons of maths. so i just wanted to ask that such isolated actions where i teach someone maths or some science lessons, for gaining thier love (which is a worldly benefit) , so such action in itself as an isolated action wouldn’t constitute shirk behavior, am i right sir? here I’m not talking about the man who is a pujaari of this world and only what matters to him is world as i explained in above paragraph. I’m talking about this action in itself is permissible right? and not shirk behavior (unlike namaz, where even a single isolated rakat prayed to please someone else would constitute shirk). am i right sir that this example of me teaching a friend maths lesson to gain his love and pleasure, is totally permissible?
so just can you tell me if what i understood in paragraph one of my this answer is what you meant to say? and also that the example of maths is permissible? thank you
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Your understanding in the first paragraph is correct.
And the example quoted above is not Shirk in any way, infact it is an attitude of ihsan as required in religion where we go overboard in fulfilling certain familial/social responsibilities or favours which the person did for his friend in the above example.
On a side note: It must be kept in mind that commitment of Rayakari is not outright equal to shirk. It is a polytheistic attitude, which means a reflection of polytheism can be seen in this act and will earn him sin and continuity of such act may take it to the level of polytheism, but it is not equal to Shirk in belief which is one of the biggest sins.
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@Irfan76 @UmerQureshi sir I wanted to understand a situation that for example a person was praying on his own in masjid and some people joined him in Salah and prayed with him. Now he after finishing prayers, asks money from people that prayed behind him. and when he is asked that why are you taking money? he says “I am not taking money from you for my own prayer, but I’m taking money from you because your prayer was done through me (I helped you in doing your prayer)”. now is this action of his shirk/rayakari? one may say that this action is not appropriate because not good or likeable by Allah. but would you action of his be shirk/rayakari? because he is not taking money for his own worship but rather for the cause of making the worship of other people come through. for causing them to complete their worship. so would it be shirk?
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It is not shirk but inappropriate. Shirk is making partner with God in belief or worship. He did not do that, but inappropriately asked for compensation which is not due to others.
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