Alhamdulilah from among the many blessings of Allah upon the Believers is that he beautified them with Eeman, as well as making us like one body whereby we are at each other’s aid and support.

And before that, Allah made us allies to one another such that we advise each other with the truth and with patience.

So for example, if it were to reach us that a believer in Somalia, Syria, or Egypt was suffering hardship or difficulties, then this would cause us to suffer too, for we are one body as our Noble Prophet sallahu alayhi wa salam described.

However, this sense of emotion shouldn’t exceed the bounds driving us to do thingswhich our scholars have warned against.

One method whereby we could help one other is through offering intercession as has been reported in the hadeeth:

عن أبي موسى الأشعري رضي الله عنه قال‏:‏ كان النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم إذا أتاه طالب حاجة أقبل على جلسائه فقال‏:‏ ‏:‏اشفعوا تؤجروا ويقضي الله على لسان نبيه ما أحب‏”‏ ‏(‏‏(‏متفق عليه‏)‏‏)‏‏.‏

Abu Musa Al-Ash’ari (May Allah be pleased with him) reported:

“Whenever a needy person would come to the Prophet (ﷺ), He would turn to those who were present from those sitting with him and say, “If you make intercession for him, you will be rewarded, because Allah decreed what He likes by the tongue of His Messenger”.

[Al-Bukhari and Muslim].

Most of us are familiar with the term intercession. It means

التوسط للغير بجلب منفعة أو دفع مضرة

“To mediate on behalf of someone to bring about good or to prevent harm.”

It is largely achieved through the position and relationship of the interceder in view of those whom he believes are able to help and offer support to the individual in need.

This differs greatly to the affair of making public fundraising appeals or sending out public messages where these messages are sent to people the person doesn’t even know. Hence, we should not open this door as it is a pretext to resembling the new technique of fake charity organizations in obtaining people’s wealth via the likes of these public appeals.

However, one should suffice with carrying out what was encouraged in the aforementioned hadeeth by interceding for the person in need by directly contacting those who he knows may be able to help.

Of late, an appeal has been sent out to help out a family in Egypt – who we ask Allaah to relieve them from their hardship – and it was ascribed to Ash-Shaykh Adnan al-Masqari that he permitted them to ask for financial help as it was a necessity. Therefore I contacted Ash-Shaykh Adnan al-Masqari to ascertain whether he wanted the appeal to be shared through watsapp groups. Below is the Sheikh’s general response:

I told them to intercede for them (i.e the family) and for the people to intercede only so they (i.e family) may not fall into a disturbing situation and so that they don’t have to ask. The Shaykh as well sent me a screenshot of his answer.

Note: So perhaps the appeal was made public accidentally without the consent of the family.

I thought I would share this short message as a mere reminder since the reminder benefits the believers.

Mentioned by

AbdulFattaah Bin Uthman
Abu Fajr