The Enemies of the Household — Ibn Taymiyya, al-Dhahabī, and Ibn Ḥajar al-Makkī
A Discussion in Theology, Ḥadīth Criticism, and the History of Ideas
Among those who did not merely neglect the household but declared open war upon them stand Ibn Taymiyya, his student al-Dhahabī, and Ibn Ḥajar al-Makkī. The author examines their statements on ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib — the Trustee of the Prophet ﷺ — and lets those statements serve as their own condemnation.
Ibn Taymiyya and al-Dhahabī — stripped bare for hostility and warfare
As for a faction among them, they have taken up open Nāṣibism and stripped themselves bare for hostility and warfare against them — such as Ibn Taymiyya, the author of Minhāj al-Sunna — as he claims — and his student al-Dhahabī, the author of al-Mīzān and the historical chronicles, and those of their ilk. Enough of their circumstances has already been presented to suffice, and their books are the greatest demonstration and the most conclusive proof of this.1
Ibn Taymiyya said in the second volume of his Minhāj, p. 230:2
“ʿAlī fights in order to be obeyed, and to exercise power over lives and property — so how can this be regarded as fighting for the sake of religion? Whereas Abū Bakr fights those who apostatised from Islam, and those who abandoned what God had made obligatory, solely in order to obey God and His Messenger…”
I say: By God, look — O reader — at how he made the jihad of ʿAlī (peace be upon him) something done for worldly obedience and power — he who, together with his uncle the Lion of God al-Ḥamza, and their cousin ʿUbayda ibn al-Ḥārith (peace be upon them), was the first to step forward in single combat in the cause of God at Badr; and whose jihad at Badr, Uḥud, al-Khandaq, Khaybar, and Ḥunayn; and whose warfare against the oath-breakers, the deviants — the transgressing faction, callers to the Fire, killers of ʿAmmār — and against those who broke out of the religion: all of this he reduced to a matter of being obeyed and exercising power. Could anyone who believes in God, His Messenger ﷺ, and the Last Day say such a thing?
How true was the Messenger ﷺ when he said: “None loves him but a believer, and none hates him but a hypocrite.”
And Ibn Ḥajar al-Haytamī was right when he said in his Fatāwā:3
“Ibn Taymiyya is a servant whom God has abandoned, led astray, blinded, deafened, and humiliated — this is what the Imams who exposed the corruption of his conduct and the falsehood of his statements have clearly declared.”
Words so grave the heavens are nearly rent apart by them
And likewise Ibn Ḥajar al-Makkī, Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-Haytamī, the author of al-Ṣawāʿiq — which bears testimony against him that he is a man who has departed from truth. Sufficient as proof of how full he is of rancour, how far he has strayed from faith, and how he has taken up enmity against the Companions of the Quran, are his words therein concerning Muʿāwiya ibn Abī Sufyān, in his exact words:5
“As for what some of the innovators permit themselves of reviling and cursing him — meaning Muʿāwiya — in this he has the example of the Two Shaykhs and ʿUthmān and the majority of the Companions, so no attention should be paid to that, nor should any weight be given to it; for it has issued only from foolish, ignorant, stupid, tyrannical people — whom God cares not in which valley they perish. So may God’s curse be upon them and may He abandon them with the most hideous curse and abandonment.”
In the very act of citing these words of his — which are such that the heavens are nearly rent apart by them, the earth cleaves asunder, and the mountains come crashing down — lies sufficient reply; God is his reckoner — how audacious is he!
And both mankind and jinn know well that those whom he called innovators and revilers are none other than the Imams of the people of faith, the Companions of the Quran, the trusted custodians of the All-Merciful, upon whom are the blessings of the Sovereign Judge. {They shall come to know who is worse in position and weaker in forces.}
The volcano of his Nāṣibism erupted, pouring its lava
The eminent scholar Muḥammad ibn ʿAqīl, the author of al-ʿAtb al-Jamīl, al-Ḥusaynī al-Ḥaḍramī, said in Taqwiyat al-Īmān:6
“Ibn Ḥajar has revealed in this ill-omened statement the venom of his breast, and has uttered what any rational Muslim recoils from saying. The wine of pre-Islamic tribal zealotry intoxicated him, whereupon the volcano of his Nāṣibism erupted, pouring its lava, and he cast himself into a deep abyss. May God protect us from what has afflicted him, āmīn.”
Ibn Ḥajar is among those who knew of the soundness of the ḥadīth in which the Prophet ﷺ cursed Muʿāwiya after his claimed conversion to Islam; and who knew of the mass transmission of the cursing of Muʿāwiya by ʿAlī — the Prophet’s brother and counterpart — and the following of the progeny in that, together with the best of the Companions and the people of truth.
He gave excellent counsel to the Muslims when he said of him:7
“The distortions and obfuscations of this Shaykh have corrupted the beliefs of many Muslims across numerous lands. He, al-Dhahabī, and Ibn Taymiyya are among the greatest Nāṣibīs of the people of the Sunnah, and among the most prolific in deception and falsehood — though their ranks in that differ. Some scholars of that criminal faction have shared in much of this with them — and you find woven into the folds of some of their statements such subtle and malicious manifestations of Nāṣibism that they are the very delight of Iblīs himself; which shows that they have grown hardened in Nāṣibism, and that hatred of ʿAlī and the household has inundated their hearts, blinding them with its film. May God deal with them according to the balance of His justice, āmīn.”
The clay of the two Shaykhs is one and the same
So be on your guard against the froth of their words and the poison of their Nāṣibism. May God be pleased with our teacher, the scholar Ibn Shihāb al-Dīn, who wrote on the back cover of the book called Taṭhīr al-Janān — composed by Ibn Ḥajar al-Makkī — the following verses:
Do not thank the compilation of Taṭhīr al-Janān, nor
the false praise therein of one who transgressed and sinned.
For the clay of the two Shaykhs is one and the same:
that one is the son of Ṣakhr, and this praiser is the son of Ḥajar.
— Ibn Shihāb al-Dīn, written on the back cover of Ibn Ḥajar al-Makkī’s Taṭhīr al-JanānThe following footnotes are editorial additions accompanying the text and are not the author’s own words.
Lawāmiʿ al-Anwār fī Jawāmiʿ al-ʿUlūm wa-l-Āthār (Radiant Lights in the Compendium of Sciences and Traditions), by Majd al-Dīn ibn Muḥammad al-Muʾayyidī (d. 1428 AH). Chapter: The Enemies of the Household — On Ibn Taymiyya, al-Dhahabī, and Ibn Ḥajar al-Makkī, and Their Words Concerning the Trustee (peace be upon him).