Islam's Reformers .pdf

performed without Muhammad’s (’alaihi ’s-salâm) permitting it.’The sûrat al-Fâtiha descended in order to reveal the best ofprayers. No one has said it would be a bid’a to recite it aftersalât or prayers. It is forbidden for the entire congregation torecite it loud altogether. When the imâm says “Fâtiha”, it is goodthat everybody recite it silently. For it is mustahab to do hamdafter prayers. And the best hamd [2] is to recite the Fâtiha. It ismakrûh to recite it between fard and sunnat and in order toattain what one desires.It is bid’a to read (or recite) the Qur’ân al-kerîm or to call theazân (adhân) through a loud-speaker. For, lifeless objects usedfor producing sounds are called mizmâr, musical instruments.Thunder, cannons, rifles, owls and parrots are not musicalinstruments although they produce sounds. Merry-makinginstruments that produce sounds, bass-drums, side-drums,cymbals, flutes, pipes and loud-speakers are all musicalinstruments. Musical instruments do not produce sounds bythemselves. In order for them to produce sounds, or, in otherwords, in order to use them, you have to strike the tightlystretched leather with the stick of the drum, blow into the reed,and say into the pipe or the loud-speaker. The sound comingout of these instruments is the sound they produce. It is not thevoice of the person blowing or saying into them. The sounds ofQur’ân al-kerîm or adhân heard from the loud-speaker are allsounds produced by the loud-speaker. They are not the voicesof the muadhdhins or imâms. The muadhdhin’s voice is theadhân. From scientific, technical, religious and canonical pointsof view, the sound coming out of the instrument is not themuadhdhin’s voice; in other words, it is not the adhân. Becauseit is homophonic with the adhân, it is taken for the adhân. Whatis called the adhân has to be the muadhdhin’s own voice, withthe additional proviso that he be a sâlih (true and pious) maleMuslim. Regardless of any degree of similitude, a woman’s or achild’s voice homophonic with his or the sound produced by aloud-speaker is not the adhân. It is some other sound. Differentmusical instruments produce different sounds. The soundproduced by a loud-speaker, despite its close resemblance tohuman voice, is not human voice. It is like an imâm’sphotograph in a book or his image on a television screen.[2] Thanking and lauding Allâhu ta’âlâ.- 289 -