[meridiasas]

None of them have said this, everyone is well aware of what the mashoor opinion is but because their are multiple narrations from Imaam Malik (rah) than they gave this as the sharh (i.e. Bilaal Philips and one other man).



If you only listen to half of what people say, than everything is an insult. None of the Salafis said Imaam Malik (rah) made this ruling (i.e. sadl) - they said this was the position of his student based on what he saw, not what Imaam Malik (rah) actually gave as a ruling.

As for your statements on qabd/sadl, or even on the madhab which neither of us is on, I would rather not speak about it until I've learned what I can.

As Salamu Alaykum

The best way to find out how the Malikis derive their rulings is to look at the Maliki sources themselves.


I used to be a Maliki and studied the following works

1) al Akdhari w/ Shaykh Muhammad Rami Nsour who studied under Shaykh Murabit al Hajj of Mauritania and others

2) al Murshid al mu'in (of Abdul Wahid ibn Ashir) w/ Shaykh Hamza Yusuf who also studied it from Shaykh Murabit al Hajj, and other scholars in Mauritania

3) 1/2 of Risala ibn Abi Zayd al Qayrawani with Ustadh Muhammad Yahya who studied with Shaykh Murabit al Hajj and other Maliki maurianian scholars for 2 years.

4) Studied the sections of Tahara and Salah of the Mukhtasar Khalil (The top Maliki primer ) with Shaykh Khatry of Mauritania at the Advanced Deen Intensive 1999

So my education in the Maliki madhhab was strictly from the mauritanian way which is highly respected amongst the other Malikis as strictly adhering to only the dominant position of the school.


If you read the above text which is from the Maliki scholars it quotes al mudawwana al qubra which is a Q and A book of the fatawa of Imam Malik as transmitted by his direct student ibn al Qasim and compiled by Sahnun.

In al-Mudawwana (vol. 1, pg. 75-76), Imam Malik has been recorded to have said, "Putting the right hand on the left in salah, I have no knowledge of it in the compulsory (fard) prayer, it is thus disliked (makrooh). But in the supererogatory (nafl) prayer there is no harm (in folding the hands), it is left to the individual to decide."

The overwhelming majority of Maliki scholars hold that the sadl is the mashhur position of the madhhab whereas qabd is a minority position.


Now what does Dr Bilal Philips says the reason is in his book evolution of fiqh?

"Malik was tied and beaten until his arms became severely damaged to such a degree that he became unable to clasp them on his chest in Salaah and thus he began the practice of praying with his hands to the sides according to some reports." p. 78 Evolution of Fiqh 2nd Edition


If you check on that page there is no footnote to substantiate that claim and as already noted, the Maliki scholars including Imam Malik himself is recorded as to why he did so and it wasn't because of an injury. This is further substantiated in Ibn Rushd's book Bidayat al Mujtahid which is a work on khilaf amongst the mujtahidun and the work by the Shafi'i scholar Imam Sha'rani in his Mizan al Kubra as well as other works.For more evidence I recommend you reread my original post on the primay proofs and secondary proofs for why the Maliki do so. There is even a short work in Arabic produced on the very topic of sadl and how the Malikis defend that position and their proofs.

So we have to ask ourselves how did the Salafis like Dr Bilal Philips and others substantiate that claim about why the Maliki school prays like that. Did they consult what Imam Malik actually said as recorded by his direct student ibn al Qasim in Sahnun's Mudawwana? Did they look at the most reliable primers and text proof encyclopedias of the Maliki school?

Based on what was written in Evolution of Fiqh and recycled ad naseum in some Salafi websites and books, they didn't. As a person who had an opportunity to study some of the most well known short primers of the Maliki madhhab from 1998-2002 it shouldn't have been difficult to find (and I'm considered just a student).

With all those works and proofs available in both Arabic and now in English, there was no excuse for Salafi scholars like Dr Bilal Philips to present what he did in that book. That shows he was either unaware of what the Malikis have said, which is irresponsible when publishing a book to be read by everyday people, or ....the worst, which I hope it isn't..that he knowingly misled people into believing that this is why Malikis pray like that ...because of an injury their Imam had with the local governor of Madinah.


Wa Llahu Alim