GOOD MANNERS IN DISCUSSION

Praised be Allah and blessings and greetings upon his prophet.

This stay in Tunisia allowed me to observe a society abounding with debates. After the society was toughly educated to respect the sole way, the hardly gained freedom gave each one the right to express himself. Politics is the most visible part of these strong discussions but debate is everywhere: in offices, mosques, homes, etc. For these exchanges to be constructive, let us try to know and apply the appropriate manners that Islam teaches us. It is possible that you have never heard a Friday sermon on how to discuss; yet dialog plays a significant role in society and Islam has a lot to teach us.

The first aspect is to say the truth. It seems so simple, but for example when you arrive late at an appointment, do you say the truth? How many people say: “There was a traffic jam”, whereas traffic jam is all the time, and they should have calculated these unexpected situations. So brother, say the truth: it is not the traffic but your carelessness and you have no excuse. When I ask a brother: did you say that?! He answers: did you hear what he said?! My God! How difficult it is to get him say: yes, I said it! Same thing if I ask: have you done what I asked you? He answers: So and so happened. Brother, when you are asked something, tell the truth: I did not do it, simply answer what you are asked, then if you have something to add, say it. During a debate, if there is a disagreement, it is of high importance to strictly say the truth or else the debate becomes completely mixed up. If your opponent says something right, say that you agree because it is right. Do not believe all the bad things people say against your opponent unless you have irrefutable proofs. Do not state a point if you have doubts about it. Say that you don’t know if you don’t know. If a question surprises you, say that you didn’t think about it yet and you need time before answering; do not rush to give a wrong answer because this will show your falseness: you are trying to show you’re right whereas you are lost. If a question bothers you and destabilizes your convictions, ask yourself: why do you believe in it? If you find yourself in the middle of what you believed and what is presented to you, admit that you see relevant points with your opponent but you still believe in your conviction and you will have to elucidate what looks like contradictions. Your guideline in the debate is: why are you actually convinced of your position? That question will lead you to your fundamental argument: if it is valid, you win, if it is proven to be wrong, you will abandon your point of view; don’t waste your time with all other minor arguments.

Brother, you have to know that no matter the cause you are defending, having the opportunity to learn something new is better than having many people following you, because the more you learn, the higher you increase in wisdom and experience, and the better you will fight for your cause. So no matter the cause you are defending, for example discussing with an atheist to convince him of Allah’s existence, listen to him and look for any positive point in his reasoning to use it. And if you are debating with a person who does not hide his hatred and contempt for you and is venting critics or even insults on you, you have to know that it is a gift from Allah, especially if the person knows you well and searches for your weak points, because you will never find someone showing your faults so clearly. So be fully listening and look for the truth in what he says. Even if you did not make the mistake, maybe you have done something that let people think that you have done it, or you wrongly expressed yourself and this is how it has been interpreted, or you naively trusted and now things turn against you, or you confided your secrets and now everybody knows it. So take all these critics like a remedy and know that improving your reality is much more important than defending your image. When searching for the truth, we do not get offended, we do not feel humiliated, we do not loose our temper, we do not hate our opponent, we do not want him down, we do not look for arguments « to be right », we do not debate on the persons, and we stay focused on our topic.

One very obvious violation to truth is reasoning by allegiance: the person who made this statement is from my side, so it is true, I have to defend it in anyway ; the person who made another statement is not from my side, so he is from the opponent and he is wrong. Brother, if you think this way, you have turned you back on the truth long ago and you will not go far with this deadlock attitude. Let us use Omar’s advise, may Allah be pleased with him: “do not look at who said but what he said”, so do not judge ideas according to who pronounced them, but the authors should be considered according to their words.

If you show the mistake of your opponent, clearly show where it starts and where it ends. No need to add assumptions and exaggerations. Do not attack his intention, the Prophet (s) said « why didn’t you open his heart to see if he said it sincerely?!” Do not look for default in his personality with no relation to the subject just to discredit him. Ask your question or clearly state your objection and forget dramatic introductions or early conclusions. Compare Zulaykha’s words: “What is the punishment for the one who tried to dishonor your family?! He has to be sent to prison or receive severe torture” to Yusuf’s words: « She was seducing me ». Don’t use technics to make him feeling guilty or to look like a victim like Yusuf’s brothers: « Father, why don’t you trust us for Yusuf while we are protecting him so well?! »

There is no more discussion with someone who is not telling the truth. What use discussing with someone who is not telling the truth but only wants to be right? If you face such a person, your objective should be to show that he is not searching for the truth.

Let me give you an example. I once had a trainee who turned against me and started visiting my centers and trainees to turn them against me. I met him and asked him what was the problem. He said there was no problem at all. Then we travelled to his hometown for roqya campaign. He went there before us to turn the organizers and ulamas against me and announce that I was not coming. When we arrived, we set things back to normal and held a meeting with him and the ulamas. I repeated my question to him: what is the problem? He gave an argument against djinn catching. I answered and he said: “Actually, the problem is that roqya centers do not have medical legitimacy and if someone dies in the center, we are not legally covered”. I said “That’s enough! You are just a snake, any time you are confronted, you turn around and you say things behind people’s backs. According to you, we should close all roqya centers, mine and others, so why don’t you attack sorcery centers as well? ». Once you have established that your opponent is not searching for the truth you have to draw conclusions accordingly.

If he is a preacher, he has to be relegated to mere student. How can someone who is not searching for the truth but wants to dominate be a religious leader? Don’t think that it can be solved with « no brother, you are not searching for the truth, you are bringing up any kind of argument just to be right ». “Oh yes, that’s true, I got the lesson”. No, this situation needs deep questioning, change in attitude and approach, getting rid of your preacher’s pedestal in order to become a desiring learner again, and stop for good attacking and blaming anyone before meeting him and knowing all his arguments.

According to me, one of the most dramatic problems the Muslim community faces, is having religious leaders practicing experimentation on society scale. From the simple neighborhood preacher to an international Islamic group leader, you have a huge responsibility because all these people follow and trust you in the name of Islam, these youngsters believe in you more than their parents. You have to know by heart the Prophet (s) and his companions’ strategy in religion management so you can refer to it each time you make a decision especially to avoid trouble and confrontations in order to work in depth and length, although there were moments where they needed to take strong positions and confide in Allah. This topic does not fit here, but mistakes and sacrificed generations could have been avoided through internal discussions in islamic groups and listening to each other. Unfortunately the status of nearly dictators of founders that are chiefs for life prevented from listening to persons with other skills, like the quality of being in the field, being aware of what is going on in real life and outside the group. The disdain towards « little » brothers prevented facing real problems and the whole work ends in failure and one generation is sacrificed. Conclusion: always keep an attentive ear as the greatness of a saving opinion could be hidden behind an apparently modest author.

If a journalist lied, he must be punished. A lie in media can have devastating effect on a politician, a firm or a family. This is not freedom of speech and opinion any more but we are facing destroyers: unable to say the truth, here they are inventing anything to gather attention and defend their cause, or at least break others’. Brothers and sisters do not buy and read false publications, boycott can be helpful but there must be laws severely dealing with misbehaviors.

If it is a politician, he must be prosecuted. Lying to overcome an opponent, destroying to dominate, these people are pure danger. Once their true nature is revealed, they must be neutralized, and banned from political activities. The problem comes from their followers, their allies known or unknown. So their bad faith must be revealed as much as possible and as needed, the same thing for their allies. You see that it is about cleaning up the society by promoting the truth and weakening those refusing it. The basis of this work is: how much is our society attached to the truth? Indeed, the more we have incompetent opportunists and less real persons fight to purify the society the more falsehood will dominate. Hence it is vital to educate on truth because my conviction is that our global situation is reflecting our individual condition; in other words do not complain that the society is corrupted, rather look for your own rottenness, and if you can change yourself, you can’t imagine how much it will change the world.

You got it, telling the truth is the essence of the debate that allows information to correctly flow, ideas to be built up, differences to be confronted, and opponents to respect each other, everyone to enrich and progress in his search for truth. Ma sha Allah! What a relief, what a blessing! I remember a discussion I once had with my boss when I first worked as an engineer. We started with two different views and we discussed again and again about our arguments, such a clean discussion where none of us was trying to defend himself, but only looking for the interest of the company until we came to an agreement. Still there was a part that was not clear and I had to do some research in the work until it became clear. After this discussion I said to myself: if only Muslims could discuss like that! I never had or saw a debate like that between Muslims, with this level of respect, disinterest and building spirit. We would progress 10 times faster in construction of Islam. So many times when we disagree with our Islamic leaders, if we discuss a single point we receive plenty of arguments mostly non relevant. And be careful! Mr. X cannot stand contradiction. If you resist him, you are likely to be called dissident or opponent, black sheep or accused to have dangerous view, put away from responsibilities and your influence will be limited, being closely watched by sneakers listening to your conversations or pretending to support you.

This love for truth and general interest can be found in the hadeeth : « whoever believes in Allah and The Day of Judgement, should say something good or keep quiet”. So during the discussion, don’t say a word if you are not sure it is a good thing to say. Waw ! All the derisive and mocking comments disappear, aggressive remarks, formulas to influence, all gone, just the important things remain.

Telling the truth, searching for the truth until fake arguments become irrelevant and only matters the content of the speech, this is the basics of the debate. In sha Allah, we are now going to review other Islamic rules often forgotten or unknown by Muslims. Listening to both parties before having an opinion, this a compulsory rule for a Muslim judge. Unfortunately, how many preachers go into public criticism of a person they never spoke to. So whoever tells you bad things about a person, do not take sides for and do not make a decision until you listen to the other person.

The Sahabas may Allah be pleased with them, in the assembly of rasool Allah (s), don’t interrupt anyone speaking and don’t raise their voice on anyone. They did not asking permission to speak: everyone would listen to the first who speaks and keep quiet once he started speaking. Allah forbid them to raise their voice over the voice of the prophet (s), so the voices were never raised. What a wonderful assembly and what noble manners! Those who love the sunnah and claim to be sunnah adepts should stick to these etiquettes and be different from coffee shop and street atmosphere, even better manners than the parliament and show the world an outstanding level of education. In this way, people could see brilliant manners of Islam instead of seeing people shouting at each other without listening, gesticulating, looking more like an aggressive band of wolves than men of God, carrying mercy.

Repeating the same sentences in a louder voice is not pedagogical, unless probably for donkeys, and leads to dialogue of the deaf and polemic that Islam cautions against. Instead of repeating the same thing, ask yourself why he did not understand what you said and try to analyze his point of view; when you will understand the other person, you will adjust your speech to be understood and the debate will move forward in sha Allah.

See also on this topic: the bats, the ten sunnah of pharaon and the five sunnah of Belkys.