A Muslim Convert Once Before

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ Ustadz William Voller wrote that the two primary colleges of Islam in the Hijaz and Iraq, which were the forerunners to the four Sunni schools of jurisprudence, Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi’i and Hanbali, differed as to what it is that is prohibited.   The Hijaziyyah went with the substance of the intoxicating liquor, the ‘Iraqiyyah went with the intoxicant in the liquor.   This is a subtle but important difference.   The Hijaziyyah used, “Any drink that intoxicates is prohibited,” from the Shaykhayn , and, “Whatever intoxicates in a greater quantity is also unlawful in its smaller quantity,” as recorded by Imam Abu ‘Isa Muhammad ibn ‘Isa as-Sulami at-Tirmidzi ( r.a. ), Imam Abu Dawud Sulayman ibn al-Ash’ats as-Sijistani ( r.a. ) and Imam Abu ‘Abdullah Muhammad ibn Yazid ibn Majah ( r.a. ), to justify that the whole substance is prohibited.   They understood khamr in the general sense of intoxicant, using, “Every intoxicant is k...

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ   Ustadz William Voller wrote that the word used in the Qur’an relating to alcoholic beverages is khamr , which derives from the root “ kha-mim-ra’ ”, meaning, “to mix or cover.”   “ Khamr ” can mean “any intoxicating thing that clouds, or covers the intellect,” as per Lisan al-‘Arab , such as when ‘Umar ( r.a. ) said that the Prophet ( s.a.w. ), said, “ Khamr is that which mixes up the mind.”   Here, “mixes up” is “ khamarah ”.   This is found in the Shaykhayn .   Khamr can refer to wine from grapes; in particular, pressing grapes, khamran ; and dates.   سُوۡرَةُ یُوسُف … قَالَ أَحَدُهُمَآ إِنِّىٓ أَرَٮٰنِىٓ أَعۡصِرُ خَمۡرً۬ا‌ۖ … (٣٦)   … Said one of them, “I see myself (in a dream) pressing wine.” … (Surah Yusuf:36)   As recorded in Swahih Muslim , the Prophet ( s.a.w. ) said, “ Khamr is from these two trees,” while pointing to grapevines and date palms.   Linguistically, however, khamr ...

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ   Ustadz William Voller wrote that scholars award a hadd , fixed penalty, to a sane adult Muslim witnessed drinking khamr by two upright people, and he has the smell still on him or is inebriated.   There is consensus on this due to the narration, “If a person drinks khamr , subject him to stripes; if he repeats it, subject him to stripes.”   Most jurists set the punishment at eighty strikes although Imam Abu ‘Abdullah Muhammad ibn Idris ash-Shafi’i ( r.a. ) stated forty owing to how a hadits from Sayyidina Abu Sa’id Sa’id ibn Malik al-Khazraji al-Khudri ( r.a. ) could be understood: “The Messenger of Allah ( s.a.w. ) awarded forty strikes with two shoes.”   The Hanafi school differs in only applying the uppermost hadd penalty for wine from dates or grapes, other intoxicants are punished only for inebriation.   Inebriation is described as someone whom under the influence “does not understand speech, whether less or mo...

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ Brother William Voller posted, on The Sharing Group, on the 29 th May2016, “Are there such a thing as absolute truths or universal laws in this universe?   Brother Colin Turner, I was reading ‘In the Name of the Rose’.   All those years of study could have been achieved by simply reading this book!   Paraphrasing the character, William, he poses the question I do, and answers that logic works only within a logical framework, since it presumes something to be true based on a logical truth not an actual one.   For example, this is a triangle because it has three sides, but God need only interrupt this with an angle to change ‘triangle’ from having the need of three sides and thus make the logic false once more.”   Brother Abdul-halim Vaz : What does it mean for a triangle to not need three sides?   Brother William Voller : The definition is changed.   Essentially a triangle is, when we give it the logical defi...

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ   The following is taken from Alcohol in Islam by Ustadz William Voller, on the 26 th August 2014.   Perhaps one of the biggest barriers for Muslims to integrate into British culture is alcohol.   This article examines the history of drinking, its ruling in Islamic law and the effects of alcohol abuse.   It concludes with identifying a more nuanced approach to alcohol that is both compatible with Islam but sensitive to the deeply embedded cultural habits of the British.   People have used alcoholic drinks for many different reasons for millennia.   The earliest written account comes from the Mesopotamian tale, “The Epic of Gilgamesh”, some four thousand years old.   It describes the half man / half beast Enkidu-being tamed, symbolically cultured, with ‘the custom of the land’ of drinking beer, which he drank becoming ‘expansive and sang with joy.’   He became aware of himself through intoxication; an a...