Advice for the Muslim

ight path. Al-Imâm al-Baidâwî, in the interpretation of the
Qur’ânic verse, “You cannot make the dead hear,...” says, “They
are like the ones who obstruct their ears from the right word.
Allâhu ta’âlâ bestows salvation of those whom He wishes by
making them hear.” Allâhu ta’âlâ likens those who are obstinate in
disbelieving to the dead. This âyat karîma resembles the 56th of
Sûrat al-Qasas: “You cannot lead those whom you love to belief.
But Allah makes whomever He wishes attain belief.” Ibn al-
Humâm further asserts: “Making the dead hear is peculiar solely
to Rasûlullâh.” To us, however, one must document a deduction
that something is peculiar solely to Resûlullâh. There is no such
document for this. Neither Hadrat ’Umar’s question nor the
answer given to him allude to such a peculiarity. Although Ibn al-
Humâm said, “Talking to the dead disbelievers in Badr was like
repeating a proverb,” the answer to Hadrat ’Umar shows that it
was not so. According to Ibn al-Humâm, “The hadîth ash-sharîf in
Muslim’s book which states that the dead will hear the footsteps of
the people leaving the grave after the burial points to the fact that
the dead hear and answer the questions of the angels only during
this questioning, and that they will never hear after the
questioning. Because, it is understood from the âyat al-karîma that
the dead do not hear. Allâhu ta’âlâ, to mean that disbelievers did
not hear, likened disbelievers to the dead.” Our answer is that this
argument contradicts itself. Because he who says that the dead
hear just after burial should also believe that they always hear. No
other ’âlim said that the dead would not hear after the questioning.
Moreover, the claim that they would hear for some certain time
after burial disagrees also with the âyat al-karîma.
According to the unanimity of the ’ulamâ’ of Ahl as-Sunna,
greeting the buried dead is a sunna. Great ’âlim ’Abd al-Latîf Ibn
Malak [d. Tire, Izmir, 801 A.H. (1399)] in his commentary to
Masâbih, explains the hadîth ash-sharîf about greeting the dead
and says, “This hadîth sharîf proves that those who say the dead
cannot hear are mistaken. At the end of the following hadîth
about the ‘fitna and questioning in the grave’ which is quoted in
the Sunan of Imâm Ahmad [d. Baghdad, 241 A.H. (915)] and in
that of Abu Dâwûd [Sulaimân as-Sijistânî, d. Basra, 275 A.H.
(888)], in Mustadrak by Hâkim [Muhammad an-Nishâpûrî, d.
Nishapur, 405 A.H. (1014)], in Al-musannaf by [’Abdûllah Ibn
Abî Shaiba [d. 235 A.H. (850)], in Adhâb al-Qabr by [Abu Bakr
Ahmad] al-Baihakî [d. Nishapur, 458 A.H. (1066), in the Musnad
by [Abu Dâwûd Sulaimân] at-Tayâlisî [al-Basrî, d. 204 A.H.
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