Question:
Salam
Ya shaykh Gibril
Is there an opinion in Mizan al-‘Itidal of Imam al-Dhahabi, rahmatullahi ta’la alayh, (or any of his other books, or by some other imam) to validate or to make permissible the taking of fiqh and aqida, if they themselves are RELIABLE, of the immediate students (and their students and their students and so on), basically with the isnad in fiqh and aqida of an ‘Alim (y) who is dishonest in his presentation of another ‘Alims (z) book, to muftis for fatawa against him, in doing so alim (y) intentionally shows the ‘ibarat and the jumlay concerned in alim (z)’s book out of context and not what he intended just to get fatawa of kufr against him. Because of this dishonesty has been found out and his standing their by becoming tarnished and his isnad effectively not having the sidq attached to it because of this.
Answer:
Alaykum Salam,
Al-Dhahabi’s student Imam Taj al-Din al-Subki in Qa`ida fil-Jarh wal-Ta`dil said that contemporaries’ mutual discreditation is not taken into account in the assessment of their respective merits, for example al-Hudhali’s attack against al-Bukhari’s `aqida, or the huge rivalry between Ibn Mandah and Abu Nu`aym al-Asfahani also due to `aqida, or between Ibn Hibban and the Hanafi school, and many other examples, such as — after his time — what happened between al-Sakhawi and al-Suyuti who are both great imams. So the upshot is we take what is reliable and we leave the rest regardless of what transpired of sins and mistakes when they are countable on the fingers of the hands amidst predominant goodness, and Allah knows best.
Hajj Gibril Haddad
