My Father Prevents Me from Studying at the Islamic University of Madinah: Shaykh Ṣāliḥ al-Fawzān’s Response

Question

A questioner from Britain said: “I have been accepted at the Islamic University of Madinah, and all praise is due to Allah ﷻ. However, my father prohibits me from going to Madinah, as he considers studying Islam to be a waste of time. He says that he will absolve himself of me if I were to go. How should I deal with my father, who does not even pray and gives no importance to matters of the religion?”

Shaykh Ṣāliḥ ibn Fawzān al-Fawzān (b. 1354 AH / 1933 CE) replied:

Do not obey him. Go and study and learn. He is ordering you to commit sin and not obedience, and there is no obedience to the creation when it involves disobedience to the Creator.

References

1. Shaykh Ṣāliḥ al-Fawzān’s, Sharḥ Ighāthat al-Lahfān min Maṣāʾid al-Shayṭān, lecture series delivered on 23 April 2017, recorded lesson, unpublished audio.

2. Abū Dāwūd Sulaymān ibn al-Ashʿath (d. 275 AH / 889 CE), Sunan Abī Dāwūd, ed. Muḥammad Muḥyī al-Dīn ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd, 4 vols, Dār al-Fikr, Beirut, 1994, vol. 4, p. 336, Kitāb al-Adab, Ḥadīth no. 2625.

3. Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal (d. 241 AH / 855 CE), Musnad al-Imām Aḥmad, ed. Shuʿayb al-Arnāʾūṭ, 50 vols, Muʾassasat al-Risālah, Beirut, 2001, vol. 17, p. 247.