al_etidaal_gn

“How will you be on that day when you will enjoin the doing of evil and prevent people
from good work?”
The Sahabah (Radiallahu anhuma) asked: “Will it really be so?”
Rasulullah (Sallallahu Alayhi Wasallam) replied: “In truth that is how it will be and even
worse.” Then Rasulullah (Sallallahu Alayhi Wasallam) asked:
“How will you be on that day when you will consider evil deeds as good and good deeds
as evil?” (Majma-ul-Zawaa-id)
Degrading of the Ulema
There is something quite significant in the last two thoughts expressed here. It is one
thing to perform a bad deed and completely and infinitely a worse thing to consider that
bad deed to be a good thing. In the light of Shariat it is not as bad a thing to perform an
evil deed as it is to consider that evil deed to be good.
This indicates corruption in one’s belief and such corruption is always more severe than
corruption of actions. A person may be tremendously bad sinner, but it still does not
bring him to Kufr (disbelief). But if something small has been proven and accepted as
one of the essentials of deen and a person denies it, jeers at it or make light of it, he is
excluded from the pale of Islam and becomes a Kaaflr (disbeliever).
Almost all these signs are witnessed today. Now I ask you, if the Ulema of Islam and the
men of knowledge are being denounced and abused, is it something to be wondered at?
Sayyidina Abdullah bin Mas-ood (Radiallahu anhu) once told someone: “You people are
now living in an age when many Ulema are around, and when there is a scarcity of those
men proficient and skilled in the Quranic recitation. The instructions of the Quran-e-
Kareem is very much noted but not so much attention is given to the letters thereof. ‘This
is a time when few are the beggars and numerous are the givers, when lengthy Salaahs
are performed and short are the sermons and when men give priority and preference to
deeds of righteousness over their desires and passions. But soon such an age will dawn
when few will be the Ulema and numerous the proficient readers of the Quran, when
more concern will be shown for the letters and words of the Quran than to its injunctions,
when many will be the beggars and few the givers, when sermons will be lengthy and the
Salaahs short, when men will give priority for their desires over de’ds of righteousness.
(Jami)
Yes all these will come to pass and are in fact already happening. Then too it has always
been the divine law from time immemorial that the saintly Shaikhs and Ulema have to be
abused and attacked. Never in history has it been that this denunciation and abuse against
the scholars of Islam did not take place. In the Hadeeth we have the saying of Rasulullah
(Sallallahu Alayhi Wasallam).
“It is the general practice with Allah that whatever of this world he elevates in rank, he
also lowers in rank.” (Bukhari, Abu Dawood, Nisai, Ahmed, Jami)
Al- Eti’daal Fi Maraatibur- Rijaal 114