Grand Ayatollah Shirazi remarks on delaying or suspension of all obligations and prohibitions

The daily scholarly meeting of Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Sadiq al-Hosseini al-Shirazi was held on Wednesday, the fifth day of Rajab. In this session, just like the previous meetings, the Marja answered the questions of the attendees about various jurisprudential issues.

Grand Ayatollah Shirazi discussed the ‘exclusions’ that are mentioned in the verses of the Holy Quran and hadiths in terms of implementation of Sharia, and said: The jurists have presented the opinion that some verses of the Holy Quran and some hadiths have made exclusions in relation to all obligations and prohibitions, changing their primary ruling into a secondary ruling due to these exceptions.

Referring to some of these verses and hadiths, His Eminance said: Verse 78 of Surah al-Hajj states: And in the religion of Islam, there is no hardship or difficulty for you in fulfilling your duties. Also, in verse 185 of Surah Al-Baqarah we read: The Almighty God has made the Ahkam and Duties easy for you and has not made them difficult. Also, a noble hadith has been narrated from the Holy Prophet, peace be upon him and his family, which says: There is no [place for] harming or being harmed in Islam. So, although Sharia practices are essentially obligatory under normal circumstances, there is a possibility of suspending or delaying their implementation, both obligations and prohibitions, due to exceptions in Sharia and exclusion rules such as ‘hardship’, ‘difficulty’ and ‘harm’.

Referring to another narration from the Holy Prophet, (if it were not for the fact that I do not like people saying: Muhammad, peace be upon him and his family, took help from a group and after defeating the enemies, he killed his own companions [if it were not so] I would decapitate a lot of people), the Marja said: Although the implementation of divine Hudud (punishments) is one of the obligations, and even delaying their implementation, let alone their suspension, is one of the prohibitions, that postponing the implementation of a ruling that can be done today until tomorrow is considered among the great sins, the Holy Prophet, according to this narration, has said that I suspended the implementation of Hudud in many cases so that people would not say that this Prophet was unfaithful.

Grand Ayatollah Shirazi further emphasized: These ‘exclusion’ rules and exceptions have caused the primary rulings of Sharia to be suspended, not just delaying their implementation, and therefore, such instructions have caused the suspension of many Hudud, for some reasons among which is prevention of cynicism towards Islam.