بِسْــــــــــــــــــمِ ﷲِالرَّحْمَنِ اارَّحِيم
لحمد الله والصلاة والسلام على رسول الله ﷺ و بعدالسلام
عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته
From: Umm Safura b. As-Sa'adiyyah ام صفورا السلفــــية إقرا بنت لإعجاز
Class on Photography and Videography - Moosaa Richardson, may Allāh protect him.
Transcribed by Umm Safūrā b. As-Sa'adīyyah
Transcribed by Umm Safūrā b. As-Sa'adīyyah
We’d like to invite ourselves to think carefully about an issue that so many people are heedless about regarding the information in this chapter. I really want all of you to think carefully about this, this issue that I’m going to mention now.
Since it’s related to a crime that has simply four or five ḥadīth we’ve studied today that should be sufficient to scare you from this crime and anything that might be considered a kind of this crime you should avoid it. The people have become lackadaisical and lenient with regards to the making of images in general. And I would like to invite you to think that putting pen to paper, paint brush on a paper, coloured pencil, markers what have you on the computer using Microsoft Paint, or using any number of graphics programs to produce images. These images made by hand one by one each and everyone of them is a crime! And each and every one of them is subject to what we would say goes into the ḥadīth, remember the ḥadīth on the board, “A spirit shall be made for each image that he made through which he shall be punished additionally in the fire! ”
So while an artist with a brush coloured pencil, marker or instrument(s) used by the hand like those mentioned, he might make a picture or a few pictures or even a dozen pictures in a day or in a long period of time, whereas, a person who uses a camera will make dozens of pictures very easily. Hundreds of pictures, in an hour, easily! With a camera. And I would like you to think and reflect on this that you have heard that some scholars consider images made by a camera to be permissible and that some scholars consider the images made by the camera to be from the generality of images.
If you know as a Muslim that the scholars differ about this issue if you know that, then what is your stance? What should your stance be? Is it that you take the easier fatāwa, the more popular fatāwa the one more in line with your desires or is that you have warā when we’re talking about an issue the scholars differ over and get it right the way they differ over this issue is that there is a general prohibition that is all encompassing the making of images. They differ over one kind of image made with a camera is it exempted or not?
I’d like you to think about what would the case be if the reality with Allāh is that the image made with the camera is truly capturing that which Allāh made and is not creating a new image, if you stayed away from it what will be upon you on yawm al-Qiyāmah? If you were just fearful and you were afraid that it might fall into the generality of the prohibition and you stayed away from the camera and making images with it of living beings. What will be upon you on yawm al-Qiyāmah? What crime will you have to face? Nothing, because you didn’t make any pictures. And pictures turned out to be with a camera permissible and Allāh ta’āla knows the reality.
Think on the other hand in an issue the scholars differ over, what if the haqq, what if the truth is with those like Shaykh al-Albāni, and Shaykh b. Bāz, may Allāh have Mercy on them, and as you see in front of you or what you have heard this evening from Shaykh Ṣāliḥ al-Fawzān that photography with a camera is included in the general prohibition. If these scholars are right and you took pictures then what is the result on the Day of Judgement? There is a serious implication of having the wrong position on the Day of Judgement, I want you to understand that and let us return back to our usūl (foundation) from the very foundation of matters of Islām is how a Muslim is to interact with issues of differing. Issues of scholarly differing, we have a hadīth Nu’mān b. Bashīr, may Allāh be pleased with him, one of the four hadīth that Abū Dāwūd the Imām of the Sunan said, there are for hadīth which will be sufficient for a person’s Dīn, and he mentioned from them,
“The ḥalāl is clear (and obvious), the ḥarām is clear (and obvious) and there are affairs in the middle in the grey area (in the middle) that many people do not know the correct ruling about.”
There are issues of differing where the issue is not clear. Wallahi! (by Allāh) I invite you to think, those of you who think cameras and making pictures with cameras is permissible are you very clear that Allaah Has exempted this from His general prohibition? Are you upon Bayyinah (clear proof), from Allāh and His Messenger ﷺ? Is the exemption of the camera from the general prohibition of picture making as clear to you as the prohibition itself? Are you confident that this is an exemption not by Shaykh b. al-Uthaymīn or Shaykh Fulān, may Allāh Mercy on them. But from Allāh and His Messenger ﷺ are you confident or are you unsure?
If you are unsure then you have a manhaj in dealing with this issue, if you are confident then to you that fatāwa and you will face what you are upon and you are responsible for your decision. If you say that you’re unsure and you are honest with yourself and say, “I’ve read the arguments of those who say cameras are not permissible, yet there are still some holes that I find or some parts of the argument that I’m unsure about and not convinced with.” Then you are convinced with the original rule that picture making is impermissible and one of the sources of the most grievous punishments on the Day of Judgement.
The ḥalāl is clear, the ḥarām is clear and between the ḥalāl and ḥarām there are grey areas, matters that are confusing and not many people know the correct position in them. “Whoever stays safe from those grey matters those affairs of differing that the people don’t seem to know about clearly then he has protected himself, his honour and his religion. And those people who fall into the Shubuhāt (doubts) they fall into the grey areas between the ḥalāl and ḥarām where the people are confused they will fall into the ḥarām!
And just like the shepherd that allows his sheep to graze around a boundary that he has not allowed to cross, so long has he keeps letting his sheep go right up to the boundary the gate, right on the border sooner or later some of those sheep are going to jump over. And for every king he has boundaries (he has limits) he has posts in the land that you are not allowed to cross and those boundaries for Allāh are His prohibitions!”
The ḥalāl and the ḥarām. Yes.
That’s the ḥadīth or part of the ḥadīth of Nu’mān b. Bashīr, may Allāh be pleased with him, that you all should know as it is apart of the arbā’īn the forty ḥadīth al-Nawawi and it gives us mentioned a very strong principle when the people differ over something then if it’s about something being ḥarām or ḥalāl then stay away from it.
Keep yourself safe, don’t put yourself on jeopardy on the Day of Judgement go back to your foundation of safety and security and being far away from something that could be disobedience to Allāh ta’āla. Especially when you can compare these two things clearly those who take a pen, a pencil, a paintbrush, a marker and they make and image, a hand drawn image of a living thing they will face the most grievous and horrible punishment in the Hereafter and according to a number of great senior scholars the same applies to the person who pushes the shutter, the button on the camera that captures the image on the negative that produces the image or now it’s digital photography so there’s no negative whatever the process may be. Someone who uses modern technology to make a picture according to some of the greatest, the senior scholars of our time this is from the generality of picture making and it is also impermissible. So while the hand drawing artists make pictures these photographer takes hundreds of pictures! Each one of those pictures will be brought to life on the Day of Judgement with a separate soul and will be a source of extra agony and punishment on that Day, and we ask Allāhu ta’āla for safety!
And as I have mentioned this issue I would also like you to think more deeply on this issue, remember the camera that a person uses a camera to make dozens or hundreds of pictures in a short amount of time and that a spirit shall be made for each image he made through it which he shall be punished additionally in the Hellfire as the ḥadīth we have studied today has proven. I would like you to think about something else to compare and that is the very definition of VIDEOGRAPHY.
The taking or making images through video camera some people are quick to assume that this is also ḥalāl! That this is also permissible. What is the definition of videography?
The true definition of video, videography (various definitions):
- Videography refers to the process of capturing of moving images on electronic media, video tape, etc.
- Moving pictures.
(In the WizIQ class)
Look at the picture on the screen that’s called film, the film of a video, no matter what you use whether you’re using this old fashioned projector film or modern digital videography. You are capturing still frame after still frame! That’s why you have something in the video called frame forward and frame backward. The picture is not moving, the pictures are still images and they are played in rapid succession.
Thirty (pictures) per second on average! It may be sixty per second are flashed in front of the human eye in rapid succession, one after the other that creates the illusion of movement. It is very similar to the old fashioned way of drawing a picture in the corner of a drawing book, and you flip the pages and it looks there is a moving image.
Videography to this day with all of the advances and all of the new equipment it is still photography that moves the images one by one. Are you clear on that? Video contains frames no matter whether you say it’s digital video or it is an old fashioned video camera on film and all of that and every video has frames. Every one of those frames is an image, is a still image, captured that did not exist until the picture maker took it.
That image did not exist on that digital film that plastic film or traditional film until the picture maker until the cameraman took that image. That image has been created, that image has been produced and it did not exist before he made it, every one of those. So imagine, let’s say a generous sixty pictures per second when you make a video of one minute sixty seconds times sixty is 3,600 images! 3,600 images in one minute of videography.
If you don’t believe me you are free to investigate and to check it, you have made 3,600 still images, and they are played one after the other in a way that convinces the human eye that those things are moving, or perhaps thirty images per second and I am not going to guarantee the accuracy of the number of images per second but it is a number like that. So then, if you’ve understood this and you’ve understood that we don’t have guarantee from our scholars that this is exempted from the generality of picture making.
And in actuality when you study the issue of what videography is, that it is the display if still images one after the other in rapid succession, tricking the human eye into believing something is moving then you will realise that you have a made with a video image a series of thousands perhaps, tens of thousands, perhaps millions of images!
And we go back to our ḥadīth if this is not exempted how dangerous it is think about how dangerous this is if you are wrong. Videographers, think about the danger and the crimes that are being committed if you are wrong! A spirit will be blown into each of those images on yawm al-Qiyāmah! Through which you will be punished additionally in the Hellfire. We ask Allāh ‘Azza wajal to grant us safety, to grant us distance from the mushtabihāt, to grant us distance, safety and security from the affairs of the people that differ over, and we ask Him to guide us to going back to the original rule of image making if we are not clear on this exception, if it is not absolutely certain to us that this kind of image making is permissible we ask Him for safety and that He guides us away from what could be a horrible end for us and destruction and torment in the Hereafter.
This is the benefit of studying our Dīn, it’s not to say, “oh no one more ḥarām thing!” It is that you will learn about what Allāhu ta’āla loves and what He puts people in Jannah because of these actions, and what He hates and what He has prohibited and what lands people in harm in this life and in the Hereafter.
If this has awoken you then we thank Allāhu ta’āla and if has not then I ask you to think deeply and carefully about this issue, especially in light of the clarity and the authenticity of texts that are explicit in the severity of the punishment in the Hereafter for those who make images, I would like you to sincerely compare that to the level of clarity you are upon. This idea being exempted and then what the result would be if you are wrong. May Allāhu ta’āla bless us with sincerity and may He grant us an increase in knowledge and righteous actions, and may He give us ease in leaving things that He hates and that would lead to our harm.
May He give us ease in that and may He replace those things with what is more wholesome and better and beneficial from us, and may He ta’āla give us distance from the shubuhāt and the mushtarihāt and may He give us distance from whisperings and doubts of the mubtadi’ah (innovators) the people of bid’ah and the affairs that are not clearly ḥalāl or ḥarām, may Allāh ta’āla give us distance from them and safety in this life and the next.
Sallallāhu ‘alayhi wa sallam a’la nabiyyina Muḥammadi wa ‘ala ālihi wa saḥbihi ajma’īn.
Question:
Is it okay to draw, take pictures of flowers, natural scenery, mountains, etc. Does this fall under the prohibition of making pictures, also the use of smileys in text messages, emails, is this allowed? BārakaAllāhu fīk.
Question:
To deface a picture sufficient to deface the eyes or should we deface the whole face? For example, pictures in children’s book.
Question:
Is it permissible to use the various smiley faces, does the prohibition also apply to partial images of human beings such as a hand and eye. Also are silhouette of humans and animals allowed?
Question:
Is it permissible for a woman to get an ultrasound of the baby? That’s the image of the shape of the baby’s body.
Question:
What do you advise one to do if his parents have childhood pictures, etc. which they refuse to get rid of which they forbid you to destroy, should we destroy them anyway? Although the outcome and their reactions maybe very harsh or should we leave the sin to them?
THESE QUESTIONS ARE ANSWERED BY MOOSAA RICHARDSON (haafidhahullaah) AND ARE IN THE PDF!
SOURCE (PDF):
http://www.troid.ca/index.php/forum/audios-and-transcriptions/2284-moosaa-richardson-photography-and-videography#2644
Further researching :
http://www.alfawzan.af.org.sa/sites/default/files/8815.mp3
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