What Makes You a Resident in Islam?

Alhamdulillah. Continuing in a summary more or less of authored by we are in the chapter regarding the book of fasting regarding upon whom is fasting obligated. ated upon whom is fasting obligated? And the author mentions five points of criteria. Every Muslim who is sane of the age of puberty, a resident and healthy. We discussed yesterday morning, alhamdulillah, the rulings with respect to what exactly is the definition of illness and what exactly is meant by someone who is healthy. Today inshallah we will discuss the fifth and final point of criteria and that is al-im person who is a resident. A resident is the opposite of a traveler alim. When we look at the states of being with respect to a person's travel, the scholars, the jurists of Islam have two general opinions with respect to this issue. Understanding this will help clarify a lot of the things that many of us have picked up tidbits of throughout our lives over the years but still find it difficult to kind of put it all together and have a clear picture. So what is a traveler? What is a resident? And is there some kind of middle ground? So the scholars of Islam the fukah traditionally have they are of two general opinions. one which is the when we look at the companions and the we find that they are pretty much upon this first view of travel and that is that a person is either traveling or not. They are either a traveler or a resident. That's it. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says in the Quran, he mentions two states of being. He mentions the resident and the traveler. He doesn't mention a middle ground. The second opinion which is a widely accepted opinion amongst the scholars of Islam and that is that there are three categories actually. You have the traveler, you have the resident but then you have this middle ground which is a traveler resident. A traveler resident. What does that mean? a traveler resident. Well, you've got someone who is a resident. They live in their house at their address or what have you. You've got a traveler who is on his camel. He's got a camp. He's setting up tents. He is clearly traveling. He's on the way. He's perhaps in the middle of nowhere. He's between cities or towns or villages. But then you've got the resident traveler. Someone who is in an environment that is the environment of a resident but they themselves are still a traveler. They're not intending to stay there. Right? So you could imagine someone who reaches you know another city or another town or another country that they are at. They're staying in a hotel. They have all the amenities that they would in their residence. However, they don't have the intention of staying in this place. They are a traveler, but they are also a resident. And because of this difference here in viewing travel and residency, the scholars difference of opinion with respect to the rulings of travel and the rulings of a resident branch out from this. We are going to stick with the first opinion and that is that a person is either a traveler or a resident. This is what Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala mentions in the Quran and when we look through the sunnah of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam we look through all the days all of his time in which he was traveling in which he and his companions were traveling in which he was going from through the desert and at his final destination wherever that may be. we see that he was either a traveler or a resident. So for instance in Tabuk he spent 18 days. Those 18 days in Tabuk they had set up an entire camp and they were staying there with the this great military that he had with him at the time. It was the biggest that the Muslims had ever had. and he shortened his prayers throughout the duration of his time in Tabuk. We see that in the conquest of Mecca. Now notice he's from Mecca. That's where he's from. That used to be his home, right? We see that he spent roughly two weeks in Mecca at the conquest of Mecca to stabilize everything. And that's clearly a city. It's clearly a town or or bigger than a town, bigger than a village. It's a city and it would otherwise have all the amenities, maybe even better than what he was used to in Medina. And on top of that, he used to live there. However, he shortened his prayers throughout the duration of that time. And from these incidents, we see the med of Abu Hanife is 15 days. He bases this on these occurrences that in Tabuk in Mecca during the conquest of Mecca 15 days he continued to shorten his prayers. Therefore in the med of Abihanif and his four companions the Medab isn't really just based on Abu Hanifh's conclusions. It's actually five scholars that make up the Hanfi Med. Abu Hanifh is one of them. And in that med the ex the accepted opinion is 15 days. If a person is going somewhere if they plan to stay more than 15 days then they would not shorten their prayers. But if they plan to stay less than 15 days or they are not certain of how long they are going to stay, they will continue to shorten their prayers. And the other three, the mab of Im Ahmed, Malik and I, they say three days with their nights. Some say four nights and three days or three nights and four days. And the same rule again, if the person is staying for that long or is uncertain as to how long they are staying, then they will shorten their prayers. Otherwise they will make full prayer as a resident. When we look at the companions, we look at the opinions of the great scholars of the companions and even their actions. We notice that they they narrate to us incidents. they don't really narrate to us definitions right so for instance in Bkari Abbas he says that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam stayed in tabuk for 18 days and shortened his prayers therefore if we go anywhere and intend to stay less than 18 days we shorten our prayers if we in intend to stay longer than we do not. The question here is when he stayed in Tabuk for 18 days. Hypothetically, if he would have stayed for 19 days, would he have not shortened his prayers? So, is there is is the number 18 special? Is that the special number that it's it's 18? If it were 19, he would have made his full prayers the entire time. This is an incidental occurrence. He stayed there for 18 days because that's how long it took for him to finish whatever business he was there to do. It's not necessarily because of the number 18. If it were 19 or 25 or 17 or 12, the same set of circumstances are still there, are still present. Correct. At 18 days, if he would have stayed 19 days, would the circumstances have changed in any meaningful way? No, they would not have changed. Now Ib Abbz he doesn't base this statement of his on nothing. He based it on the most that he saw from the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam. So I'm going to stick with whatever he did. Right? However, when we look at it from the perspective of what were the circumstances that made him shorten his prayers, it was travel. It wasn't the number of days neither was it the distance. This is another point of contention like so anis and narrates that the prophet sallallah.aii wasallam set out on a journey and when he reached three it was time for and he stopped and he made his and he shortened his prayers. How long? How far a distance is one for? Anyone know? Good. Three miles. Not kilos. M miles. Yes. So one is three miles. Three is how many miles? Nine. Okay. So Annis is not narrating to us a definition of travel of distance. Is he? He's narrating to us an incident. This is something that happened. He set out traveling. Vhor came in at the time when he happened to be 9 miles out of Medina. If he were 8 miles out of Medina and Vhor would have come in, would it have changed the circumstances in any meaningful way? No. It would be the same set of circumstances. Also, does it mean that at 9 miles you're a traveler, but at 8 miles you're not a traveler? If we had a caravan that was a mile long, would there be a conceivable instance where those at the front of the caravan shorten their prayers and those at the end of the caravan do not shorten their prayers? Is nine miles a magic number? Is it? That's not intended on itself. What's intended are the circumstances. This is what the majority of the companions understood. We see that Omar went to Hashem. Hashem, Syria, Dimash, and winters are be brutal. There's snow. There's not a lot of snow in Medina and and Mecca, right, in the winter. And so as they reached there and they arrived, winter came in. Winter came in. It snowed. Snowed him in. And so he remained there shortening his prayers. Shortening his prayers for how long? Six months. And some of the scholars have said, well, he didn't know when he was going to leave, right? He didn't know when he was going to leave. So they say, "Maybe tomorrow we'll leave. Maybe tomorrow we'll leave." Until 6 months had transpired. But does that sound reasonable? Did Iban Omar look at all these mountains of snow and imagine that maybe tomorrow these mountains of snow will be gone. They'll disappear and we can leave tomorrow. Maybe maybe these these mountains of snow will disappear. He's there for the winter. He knows that he's going to be there for months on end. There's no doubt about that. There are no qualms with he or his entourage that they will be there for the duration of the winter. Therefore, what he understood and what Bkari inferred from this is that a person is either a traveler or a resident. What is the difference? The difference is if a person lives at a particular place or he does not. That's the only difference. They are either in their home or they are outside of their home. The amenities is not really the issue. The difficulty is not the issue. Sometimes people think that to break your fast or to shorten your prayers, you need to be having a tough time when you're traveling because that's the reason for shortening your prayers. And that's not correct. the level of difficulty is not the reason that a person is is is not just allowed but commanded to shorten his prayers when he is traveling. It is the state of being a traveler. That is what is that is the that is the defining factor here. When we look at all of this he mentioned something that's very interesting. He said whoever once after researching this in dozens of pages he c he says the following by the meaning of his words. He says, "Hence, for.

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Hassee. He said, "Hence, whoever try, whoever feels they want to play it safe, right? When we talk about knowledge, playing it safe is usually a an issue of the issue is not clear to me. So, I'm going to play it safe. Otherwise, when a person reaches a level of knowledge, it's either yes or no. It's either right or wrong. That's it. There's no safe. These are rules, right? So he says whoever feels uncomfortable and wants to play it safe then it is three days with their nights. However, whoever wants to implement what is apparent from the Quran and Sunnah and the actions of the companions and then as long as the person is not living permanently in that place, they are a traveler. Based on all of these evidences, we have instances of some of the who had shortened their prayers for up to two years because he was appointed as a judge against his will in a particular land. He didn't want to be a judge. He didn't want to live there. But he was commanded to go by the Khalifa. And so he shortened his prayers for the entire 2-year stint of being a judge there because he had not intended to live there ever. Right? And so these are we start to see something starts to clarify itself and that's what and what is that? These are obviously extreme instances but what they reflect is an understanding that the companions and tabain had and that is if a person doesn't live somewhere doesn't matter how comfortable their stay or how long they are a traveler there right now does that apply to like students that are going to come here from other countries and live here for four years or six years or eight years and become doctors and so on and so forth. Of course not. Why? Because they have they have passports, they have driver's licenses, they have a car, they have an address, they have a house, they have an apartment, they have a wife, they have if that's not being a resident somewhere, I'm not sure what being a resident would be. However, if a person were to go somewhere and be there for a week, 2 weeks, someone goes for omrah, they are a traveler during that time. They shorten their prayers and they have the the option of breaking their fast. And we'll discuss what is better tomorrow. Inshallah.

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Alhamdulillah. How are you? Okay.