Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question If someone knowingly lies about being descended from the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace), does that make him a disbeliever? I accept that it is a major sin, but I want to know whether he remains a Muslim. Answer In the name of Allah, the Most […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question My legs are sometimes apart while I do the remembrance of Allah (dhikr) and I close them when I hear the name of the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace), so I fear I hold the Messenger in higher respect than Allah and have fallen into disbelief; […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question I built a white-label trading platform that supports leveraged forex and contracts for difference. I never trade, take no share of the revenue, and earn a fixed salary. Is my work lawful, and does building the features that place these trades make me an assistant in unlawful transactions? Answer […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question My father was given framed pictures said to be for protection, and he passed a couple on to me, one of them a Nad e Ali written in the shape of a lion, with writing underneath and numeric boxes in each corner, like a taweez. May I own and […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question I joked with a friend that an anticlimactic situation was like the hadith of the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) eating chicken, since that report seems relatively unimportant. Now I fear I have committed disbelief by mocking, and if I have not, are jokes like these […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question A teacher discussing the readings of the Quran cited the variant ghalabati l-Rum at Quran 30:2, attributed to Ali and other Companions, and rejected it as anomalous for want of mass transmission. This confused me. If the only defect is a lack of mass transmission rather than a broken […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question I work at an investment bank on a methodology team. The company’s main income comes from wealth management and other financial services, which may involve interest-bearing products. My own work is to build and maintain a model that enables the firm to identify the maximum possible loss it could […]

This is the fifth in a series on mastering the Hanafi school, drawn from a seminar by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani and Shaykh Talal al-Azem. The full seminar is available here. There is a tool many students overlook on the journey to mastery: righteous company. Seek the Company of Students Who Help You Learn As well […]

This is the fourth in a series on mastering the Hanafi school, drawn from a seminar by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani and Shaykh Talal al-Azem. The full seminar is available here. A family at the bedside needs to know when to turn off the ventilator. A woman needs to know what counts as postnatal bleeding. A […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question I am considering starting a business reselling trading cards and want to inform myself before I start. On sealed products, the customer pays a fixed, known price for a sealed box. The general contents are stated on the packaging, but which cards are inside is unknown until it is […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question If I am permitted to use dry ablution (tayammum) but have impurity on me beyond the excused amount, must I remove it before praying? Answer In the name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate. Yes. If you can remove it, do so before praying. Dry ablution stands […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question Can a Muslim man be married in a church to a Christian woman if the conditions of the nikah are met, such as two male witnesses, given that he will obviously not take part in the Christian prayers? If that marriage is valid, does oral sex become clearly permissible, […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question I made a vow to pray two extra rak’as daily for thirty days. By “extra,” I meant two in addition to the obligatory prayers, not necessarily in addition to the regular sunnas. When I made the vow, I intended in my heart that I could fulfill it either by […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question I am nineteen. I left pornography and masturbation for three or four months, and my prayers and my life were in order. For the past three weeks, I have relapsed. It feels as though something has taken control of me, and I have no one to talk to about […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question As a man, am I obliged to learn the rulings of menstruation (hayd) taught in Level One of Ascent to Felicity, and do I need all of it for the Level One certificate? Answer No, you are not obliged to learn the whole chapter as Level One teaches it. […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question I rate films publicly, and some of them contain disbelief (kufr), such as references to Greek gods or a blasphemous line from a character. If I rate one highly for its story, acting, and direction while rejecting its disbelief, is that itself disbelief? Would a low rating be disbelief, […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question The Hilali-Khan translation brackets a note at Quran 47:4, after “until the war lays down its burdens,” saying one must fight the disbelievers until they accept Islam or submit to Muslim rule—seemingly glossing the word “dhalika,” though Tabari, Ibn Kathir, and Ma’ariful Quran read it no such way. Is […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question Since I was twelve, I have gone through repeated cycles of praying, then abandoning prayer, each time promising Allah I would change, and breaking every promise. After a difficult period that included a death in my family, a hatred toward Allah, the Prophet, and Islam entered my heart that […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question My friend said, “God forbid, we don’t want to date anyone,” about something Allah has genuinely prohibited, and she seemed to be using it loosely as a complaint; is that permissible for her, and am I in sin for not correcting her on the spot? Answer In the Name […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani  Question How can we reconcile our belief that Allah Most High will preserve the religion with the hadith indicating that He will take knowledge away by taking away the scholars, until none remain, and that people will then take ignorant men as their leaders? Answer In the name of Allah, […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question I am genuinely mentally ill and unable to work, and my parents care for me all day. My doctors prescribe medication that I do not take because of its side effects, but I tell them I am taking it so that I keep receiving benefits money, which I would […]

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani Question If mold has spread over part of a dish or a loaf and some of it still looks sound, may I throw the whole thing away? What if separating the good from the spoiled would be tedious, or I cannot tell whether the food has gone bad at all? […]

This is the third in a series on mastering the Hanafi school, drawn from a seminar delivered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani and Shaykh Talal al-Azem. The full seminar is available here. At the very least, a student ought to hold a strong foundational understanding of the core texts. A student who does not know a […]

This is the second in a series on mastering the Hanafi school, drawn from a seminar delivered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani and Shaykh Talal al-Azem. The full seminar is available here. Hold yourself to three things for every lesson, on condition of sincerity, and you will gain and retain a great deal of knowledge. The […]