Mu' meneen Brothers and Sisters,

As Salaam Aleikum wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh.  (May Allah's Peace, Mercy and Blessings be upon all of you)

One of our brothers/sisters has asked this question:

A.A I wanted to ask you for advice hope u could help me. A friend of my sister have told her that my friends are talking behind my back stuff that arnt true about me. They are telling ppl all kind of stuff, now my question is what shuld i do ?i dont like to meet ppl in the first place bcus i think they just do backtalking all the time about the same person they consider beeing best friends with, and thats why i am not surpriced when i heard the same about me. First i wanted to ask them if this was true but i dont know if i should do that? And am i a bad person if i dont want to meet my friends and make excuses all the time. plz help me

jazak allah kher allah hafiz

(There may be some grammatical and spelling errors in the above statement. The forum does not change anything from questions, comments and statements received from our readers for circulation in confidentiality.)

Answer:

Slander and back biting?

In the name of Allah, We praise Him, seek His help and ask for His forgiveness. Whoever Allah guides none can misguide, and whoever He allows to fall astray, none can guide them aright. We bear witness that there is no one (no idol, no person, no grave, no prophet, no imam, no dai, nobody!) worthy of worship but Allah Alone, and we bear witness that Muhammad(saws) is His slave-servant and the seal of His Messengers.

Al-Muwatta Hadith 56.10

Ibn-Muttalib ibn Abdullah ibn Hantab al-Makhzumi informed reported that a man asked the Messenger of Allah (saws) "What is backbiting?" The Messenger of Allah (saws) said, "It is to mention about a man (behind his back) what he would not like to hear." He said, "O Messenger of Allah (saws)! Even if it is true?" The Messenger of Allah (saws) said, "If you utter something false, then it is slander!"

The sin of back-biting is when someone speaks evil about another person behind his/her back; and the matter spoken is the truth. When someone speaks a lie against another person behind his/her back, it would be considered a slander, which is a much bigger sin in the sight of the Shariah and Allah Subhanah.

The person who is slandered against has a right to take the slanderer to Court, provided he/she has witnesses who heard the slanderer tell lies about the person concerned; and the prescribed punishment of a slanderer if convicted in a righteous Islamic State is eighty lashes for his evil sin in the life of this world; and if the person does not repent for his evil, a grievous punishment would await him in the Hereafter.

Al-Tirmidhi Hadith 29 (part) Narrated by Mu'adh ibn Jabal

The Messenger of Allah (saws) took hold of his tongue and said: ‘Exercise restraint on it.’ I said: ‘O Messenger of Allah (saws), would we be held responsible for what we say with it?’ Thereupon he (saws) said: ‘Mu'adh, may your mother be bereaved! Will anything else besides (irresponsible) talk cause the people to be thrown into the Hell-Fire upon their faces or on their nostrils?’

The righteous thing to do when one hears someone talk evil of another person for no just reason, is to immediately challenge the person to stop his talk; for if the person is speaking the truth he would be committing the sin of ‘back-biting’, and if he is lying he would be guilty of spreading slander; both of which are grave sins in the sight of Allah Subhanah.

If one who is slandered against does not have witnesses, or does not wish to take the matter to court; then the best and most righteous thing to do would be to absolutely ignore the slander and not worry about its consequences; for falsehood never has any legs, and retaliation will do nothing but give the Shaytaan the opportunity to spoil relations even further.

Whatever written of Truth and benefit is only due to Allah’s Assistance and Guidance, and whatever of error is of me. Allah Alone Knows Best and He is the Only Source of Strength.

Your Brother in Islam,

Burhan