Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Is Arabic the language of the people of Paradise?

 

I would like to know what the language of the people of Paradise is. Is it Arabic?.

Praise be to Allaah.

There is no
mention in the Qur’aan or in the saheeh Sunnah – as far as we know – of
which language is spoken by the people of Paradise. What is narrated
concerning that is a hadeeth which is not soundly narrated from our Prophet
(peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him), and some other reports
(athaar). 

It was
narrated by al-Tabaraani in al-Awsat, al-Haakim, al-Bayhaqi in
Shu’ab al-Eemaan and others that Ibn ‘Abbaas (may Allaah be pleased with
him) said: The Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be
upon him) said: “Love the Arabs for three reasons, because I am an Arab, the
Qur’aan is Arabic and the speech of the people of Paradise is Arabic.”

 Ibn
al-Jawzi ruled that this hadeeth is fabricated. Al-Dhahabi said: I think
that the hadeeth is fabricated (mawdoo’). Al-Albaani said in al-Silsilah
al-Da’eefah (no. 160): (it is) fabricated. 

Shaykh
al-Islam Ibn Taymiyah (may Allaah have mercy on him) said: Similarly, Abu
Ja’far Muhammad ibn ‘Abd-Allaah al-Haafiz al-Koofi, who is known as Mateen,
told us: al-‘Ala’ ibn ‘Amr al-Hanafi told us: Yahya ibn Zayd al-Ash’ari told
us: Ibn Jurayj told us, from Ibn 'Abbaas (may Allaah be pleased with him)
that he said: the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be
upon him) said: “Love the Arabs for three reasons: because I am an Arab, the
Qur’aan is Arabic, and the language of the people of Paradise is Arabic.” 

Al-Haafiz
al-Salafi said: this is a hasan hadeeth. I do not know whether he meant that
its isnaad is hasan according to the way of the scholars of hadeeth, or that
its text is hasan in general terms. Abu’l-Faraj ibn al-Jawzi mentioned this
hadeeth among the mawdoo’ (fabricated) texts and said: al-Tha’labi said: it
has no basis. Ibn Hibbaan said: Yahya ibn Zayd narrated unsound ahaadeeth
from sound narrators, so it is invalid to quote his reports as evidence. And
Allaah knows best. 

End quote
from Iqtida’ al-Siraat al-Mustaqeem (1/158). 

Al-Tabaraani
narrated in al-Awsat that Abu Hurayrah (may Allaah be pleased with
him) said: the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be
upon him) said: “I am an Arab, and the Qur’aan is Arabic, and the language
of the people of Paradise is Arabic.” 

Al-Albaani
said in al-Silsilah al-Da’eefah (no. 161): it is fabricated. 

The point is
that there is no saheeh evidence to show which language is spoken by the
people of Paradise. Hence we should refrain from speaking about this issue
and not indulge in it, and we should refer knowledge of the matter to Allaah
(may He be exalted), and focus instead on issues that will lead to good
deeds in this world. 

Shaykh
al-Islam Ibn Taymiyah (may Allaah have mercy on him) was asked: in what
(language) will Allaah address the people on the Day of Resurrection? Will
Allaah address them in the tongue of the Arabs? Is it true that the language
of the people of Hell will be Farsi and that the language of the people of
Paradise will be Arabic? He replied: Praise be to Allaah, the Lord of the
Worlds. It is not known what language the people will speak on that Day, or
in what language they will hear the words of the Lord, may He be exalted,
because Allaah has not told us anything about that, nor has His Messenger
(peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him). It is not true that Farsi
will be the language of the people of Hell, or that Arabic will be the
language of the people of Paradise. We do not know of any discussion of that
among the Sahaabah (may Allaah be pleased with them), rather all of them
refrained from speaking of that because speaking about such a thing is
discussion of something unnecessary… but there was a dispute concerning that
among later scholars. Some people said that they will be addressed in Arabic
and others said that the people of Hell will respond in Farsi, which will be
their language in Hell. Others said that they will be addressed in Syriac
because that was the language of Adam and from it stemmed all other
languages. Others said that the people of Paradise will speak Arabic. There
is no basis for any of these ideas, whether on the grounds of common sense
or in any report or text, rather they are mere claims that are devoid of any
evidence. And Allaah knows best and is most Wise. End quote. 

Majmoo’
al-Fataawa (4/299) 

And Allaah
knows best.

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