Should You Wash Your Shoes Before Mosque?
Purification in Islam: The Bedouin Hadith and Islamic Etiquette in the Mosque
Summary
This content discusses Islamic teachings on ritual purity (tahara) based on hadith narrations. Sh. Ali Mashhour analyzes how the Prophet Muhammad instructed Muslims to purify the soles of their shoes before entering the mosque, explaining that rubbing them in dirt is sufficient without requiring water. The lecture then explores a famous hadith about a Bedouin man who urinated in the mosque, examining the cultural context of Bedouin society and the Prophet's measured response. Sh. Ali Mashhour emphasizes the importance of distinguishing between ignorance and deliberate disrespect, and teaches principles of Islamic jurisprudence regarding choosing the lesser of two evils and giving people the benefit of the doubt.
Note: This transcript was generated using YouTube's automatic captioning, with AI-assisted cleanup for readability. It may contain inaccuracies due to background noise, audio quality, or limitations of the transcription software — particularly during Arabic recitation. Listener discretion is advised; please refer to the original video for precise wording.
[Arabic recitation]
Looks good.
[Arabic recitation]
What I was just telling him. I was thinking, who is this young man? two women had met. Alhamdulillah.
[Silence]
Continuing The next point that the author makes is how the prophet sallall.aii wasallam instructed that the bottoms of one's shoes be purified. Person looks at the bottom of the shoes sees that there's some kind of neessa here. How should that person go about purifying it? Do they scrub it? Do they wash it? Do they power wash it? Do they send it to the dry cleaners? They throw it away and get a new pair of shoes. What is it exactly? He says, for.
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He says on the authority of who narrates that the prophet Sam said if any of you comes to the masid then let him before entering the masid look at the souls of his shoes and if he sees any filth that has found its way into the soles of his shoes then he is to rub the soul hole in the dirt and then make salat in them. So here we don't even have the use of water. Right? Here we don't even have the use of water. Now remember we mentioned by any means necessary. So as long as the nasa is gone that's all that matters. Here's the question. What about if a person were to use a used water? Well, that's acceptable. However, is it necessary? No. And if a person were to use water because they see that this is not enough, that is a bigger problem. Because the prophet Sam said he says whoever looks for a sunnah other than mine that he is not of me. There is a difference between doing something because of circumstance and finding that the sunnah is inadequate or not enough etc. So for instance this is a good example of this. It is enough legislatively in Allah's estimate that a person rub the shoe in the dirt and make salah. However, is it possible that a person may find that that's inadequate for some other reason? Let's say for instance a person has very deep tread in his shoes. Tread in his shoes. And that neessa has found its way into the into the minutia or into the details of that tread to a point where it needs some other kind of you know some other kind of method in order to ensure that it is done away with. Is that acceptable? Sure. That's that is a circumstance which is a very specific circumstance but for the general purpose rubbing it in the dirt is good enough. However, there may be a circumstance where we may need to go beyond that or there may be a circumstance where we need to go a little bit less than that, but not for legislative reasons. Not for the purpose of pleasing Allah. We don't have to ever go past this for the purpose of pleasing Allah subhanahu.
[Arabic recitation]
Right? Is that clear? I think I think it's clear the distinction there. So, so he says the next is purifying a piece of ground that nas As has come in contact with.
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For.
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This narration. I think many of us if not all of us is familiar with on the authority of he narrates that a bedin man bed man these are people that live out in the desert they are so detached from society that they almost have a different set of rules they almost live in a different universe and so their customs vary radically and they are not as refined as people who are more accustomed to living around other people. They are naturally offensive. They're naturally crude. They're naturally rough around the edges. However, it is unintentional. what we may or what a person in in the city or a person who is more refined may see as a deliberate act of disrespect to them. They do not see it as being anything at all. It is no type of communication. And so this person got up and urinated in the masid. Please turn this fan on. Urinated in the masid. This is interesting. Urinated in the masid. Yes. Urinated in the masid for a number of reasons. Number one, for the for the bedins. Okay. Urine is not quite as big a deal. Urine is not not as quite as a big a deal and it's not necessarily a sign of disrespect in bedin culture. person urinates anywhere even revealing a person's private parts even all of this is something that as we said unrefined another thing is that the masid itself was not carpeted was not an an necessarily an interior the masid itself did not have gates or doors on it. So there were doors to the masid. Those were just openings in the wall for a person from the outside to get to the inside. There was no there is no doors. There's no locking up the masid. There is no right. As a matter of fact, the masid was basically walls and most of it had no ceiling. And so it was very common in the prophet's time saiam for wild animals to be in the masid especially at night and sometimes dogs or you know cats or snakes and so forth. They would get in the masid. They would sometimes urinate in the masid. It was common. It was not uncommon. The ground of the masjid was slightly more refined than the ground outside. Slightly meaning that the big major rocks were removed and it would be it would be swept on a semi-regular basis. And so to a bedin the masid represents a place that a person sits in the shade. That's about it. And so we see here that it is possible for the bedin, a person who who does such a thing. There's two possibilities. Number one, he is a bedin and he's behaving as bedwins do and he means no disrespect. It is an issue of ignorance. Number two, he is trying to actively communicate his disrespect to us. Based on that the reaction will be differing. Correct? And so the companions of Allah out of jealousy for their masid they took hold of him and started to you know become aggressive with him. And the prophet sallall.aii wasallam. Now in this wording of the narration the author doesn't mention any of these details but we will mention those details. He says that was remove don't stop him let him finish. Okay. Because now we have two two evils that we are presented with. One is worse than the other. Either we can have the urine, the nessa localized into one place and then deal with it or we can have it all over the masid as he runs away urinating wherever he runs and as they chase behind him. So those are two evils. Which one do we take? The lesser of the two evils. Leave him. Let him finish. So after that he told the companions to take a bucket of water and to pour it on the urine to pour it on the earth. That was it. That was the extent of purification. what does that do? It dilutes it. Makes it go into the ground. That's all. and it purifies the most superficial layer of the ground which is all that we need. In a continuation of the narration, the prophet sallall.aii wasallam said to the man, "Come here." He said, He said the masid is just not appropriate for those kinds of things. Rather the masid was built for the recitation of the Quran, the remembrance of Allah and salah, etc. Why? because he is distinguishing for this man the difference between the masid and a place where people would just go to congregate and hang out or a building in the marketplace. This may even be acceptable in some marketplaces where this man has gone right and so this is why the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam told him this. This is an incredible level of restraint. The prophet sallall.aii wasallam teaches us here to give the benefit of the doubt to be gentle with one another especially with those who are don't know. My question is let's say this incident happened says okay we all go home next day rolls around the same beduin man is there and then he gets up and urinates in the masid again what would the reaction be in that situation.
[Arabic recitation]
Understand the prophet Sam specifically would his reaction be the same. What about the third day when he comes back? Would it again be let him finish? Is this how it would have been dealt with? Absolutely not. Because there's a difference between dealing with ignorance and dealing with ignorance, right? There's ignorance, lack of knowledge. Ignorance, a a purposeful intent to offend and be controversial and so forth. Now, I'm not saying he would have killed him or strung him up or anything that. There are other ways that he would have dealt with this. However, the initial benefit of the doubt would have receded.
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And.
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Alhamdulillah.