KHATAM OF BUKHARI – ANOTHER RIYA STUNT
Question
Please view this advert. Is there a Sunnah basis for making khatam of Bukhari Shareef “in solidarity” with the Palestinians as stated by the advertisers? Would Khatam of the Qur’aan not be better?
I believe that I should also express my personal views regarding the organisers of the Bukhari khatam. Moulana Muhammad Aboosomar who is promoting this khatam studied under Sheikh Awwaamah in Syria for years. I as well as others went to visit the Sheikh. Moulana Muhammad briefing us before we entered the presence of the Sheikh, said: “You must not expect these people to be like our people.” We did not understand this conundrum. However, when we saw ‘these people’, we understood what he meant. There was no roohaaniyat in them. Besides the Sheikh, I was astonished to observe that his sons and the other sheikhs did not have Shar’i beards, yet they are teaching the big Hadith kitaabs. There is no sign of Taqwa on them. They appear to be cut off from the Sunnah. Now it is this mentality that is pushing for khatam of Bukhari Shareef.
Please comment.
Answer
There is absolutely no basis in the Sunnah – in the Shariah – for this type of ostentatious congregational khatam of Bukhari Shareef. It is bid’ah. In fact it is a bid’ah with the aggravating factor of giving preference to the Kitaab over the Qur’aan Majeed. Bukhari Shareef was written several centuries after Rasulullah (Sallallahu alayhi wasallam).
Furthermore, just as making congregational khatam of Bukhari Shareef for occasions such as the Palestinian calamity is bid’ah, so too is it bid’ah to engage in congregational and ostentatious khatam of the Qur’aan Majeed. Whoever desires to make khatam and dua, should do so silently and in privacy. Advertising ibaadat is haraam. It is evil. It is riya. It is shirk.
There is no basis in in the Sunnah for these khatam practices. Why do these people find it abhorrent to adhere to the Tareeqah of the Sahaabah? If there was any merit in such congregational khatams of even the Qur’aan Majeed, the Sahaabah would have been the very first to have adhered to it. All new-fangled practices advertised as ibaadat are mardood acts of bid’ah.
The comment of Hafiz Ibn Hajar (Rahmatullah alayh) a thousand years after Rasulullah (Sallallahu alayhi wasallam), is not a valid basis for incorporating a non-existent act into the framework of the Shariah, and to give it preference over the Qur’aan Majeed or to place it on par with the Qur’aan Majeed.
It is imperative to examine every new practice on the basis of the Sunnah which had existed during the era of Khairul Quroon. Rejecting the Bukhari Shareef khatam is not a denial of the benefits of reciting it. But the ostentatious method and congregational form with which the recitation is clothed render it a bid’ah.
Followers of the Shaafi’ and Hambali Math-habs may engage in Qunoot-e-Naazilah which according to them is Sunnah. But even Qunoot is not Sunnah for Hanafis. When there is no emphasis on even Qunoot which Rasulullah (Sallallahu alayhi wasallam) did perform once in his lifetime, what conclusion should we make regarding khatam of Bukhari Shareef which has absolutely no basis in the Sunnah?
Muslims should restrict themselves to Dua in privacy. All innovated congregational acts are devoid of barakat, ikhlaas and qubooliyat. All such acts are bid’ah stunts. Bid’ah was most abhorrent to the Sahaabah.
10 Rabiuth Thaani 1445 – 26 October 2023