*🚫 The Imams of Islam on Adhering to the Sunnah and Avoiding Blind Imitation!* These are some of the statements of the noble Imams (may Allah have mercy on them) emphasising the obligation to follow the authentic Sunnah and the prohibition of following them blindly without understanding. ⸻ *✍️ Imām Abū Ḥanīfah (رحمه الله) said:* • “If the ḥadīth is authentic, then that is my madh’hab.” 🔗 Ibn ʿĀbidīn, al-Ḥāshiyah (1/63) • “It is not permissible for anyone to accept our views unless they know the source from which we derived them.” 🔗 Ibn ʿĀbidīn, Ḥāshiyah ʿalā al-Baḥr al-Rā’iq (6/293) In another narration: • “It is forbidden for someone who does not know my evidence to give legal verdicts based on my words.” • “We are only human; we may say something one day and retract it the next.” • He also said to Abū Yūsuf: “Woe to you, O Yaʿqūb! Do not write down everything you hear from me. I may hold an opinion today and abandon it tomorrow, and hold another view tomorrow and abandon it the day after.” • “If I say something that contradicts the Book of Allah or the Sunnah of the Messenger ﷺ, then abandon my statement.” 🔗 al-Fullānī, al-Īqāẓ (p. 50) ⸻ *✍️ Imām Mālik ibn Anas (رحمه الله) said:* • “I am only a human being — I may be right and I may be wrong. So examine my opinion: whatever agrees with the Qur’ān and the Sunnah, accept it; and whatever does not, reject it.” 🔗 Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr, al-Jāmiʿ (2/32) • “There is no one after the Prophet ﷺ whose statement is always accepted and never rejected — except the Prophet ﷺ.” 🔗 Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr, al-Jāmiʿ (2/91) ⸻ *✍️ Imām ash-Shāfiʿī (رحمه الله) said:* • “There is no one except that some of the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ may be unknown to him or escape him. So whatever I say, or lay down as a principle, that contradicts what has come from the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, then what he said is to be followed — and that is my view.” 🔗 Ibn ʿAsākir, Tārīkh Dimashq (15/1/3) • “The Muslims have unanimously agreed that whoever has become aware of a Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, it is not permissible for him to abandon it in favour of anyone’s statement.” 🔗 al-Fullānī (p. 68) • “If you find something in my writings that contradicts the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, then act upon the Sunnah and disregard what I have said.” In another version: “Then follow it and do not look to anyone else’s statement.” 🔗 an-Nawawī, al-Majmūʿ (1/63) ⸻ *✍️ Imām Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal (رحمه الله) said:* • “Do not blindly follow me, Mālik, al-Shāfiʿī, al-Awzāʿī, or al-Thawrī. Rather, take from where they took.” 🔗 Ibn al-Qayyim, Iʿlām al-Muwaqqiʿīn (2/302) • “The opinion of al-Awzāʿī, the opinion of Mālik, and the opinion of Abū Ḥanīfah — all of them are opinions, and to me they are all equal. The only binding proof is in the reports (i.e. the aḥādīth).” 🔗 Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr, al-Jāmiʿ (2/149) • “Whoever rejects a ḥadīth of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ is on the verge of destruction.” 🔗 Ibn al-Jawzī, Manāqib Aḥmad (p. 182) 📱 WhatsApp: https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VaguHlo4o7qTg6y3cd2q ‎ا═•═🕌═•═ا *Masjid Daar Al-Hadeeth* 96B Lower Clapton Road, Hackney, E5 0QR