Domestic Dealings

Hazrat Abdullah bin Mas‘ud loved his wife and children. When he entered the home, he would clear his throat and speak up so that the household members would know [he arrived]. His wife, Hazrat Zainab relates, “One day Hazrat Abdullah entered the house when an elderly woman was giving me an amulet to wear”. It is the habit of women to sometimes make use of charms or amulets perhaps in hope of gaining blessings. She knew Abdullah bin Mas‘ud did not like this. She says, “So in fear of him I hid it beneath the bedstead I was sitting on. He came and sat next to me and looking to my neck he said, ‘What is this thread which you have placed on your neck?’ I told him it was an amulet. He broke it and threw it away immediately saying that the family of Abdullah is free from shirk [associating partners with Allah]. Abdullah bin Mas‘ud then said, ‘I heard from the Holy Prophet (sa) that making use of charms and amulets is shirk.’ I then said, ‘What are you saying? My eyes would swell up and become painful and so I would go to a certain Jewish woman to use the amulet. and I would be relieved after doing so.’ Abdullah bin Mas‘ud then said to me, ‘These are all works of Satan. The following prayer of the Holy Prophet(sa) should suffice you:

اَذْہِبِ الْبَاْسَ رَبَّ النَّاسِ اِشْفِ وَاَنْتَ الشَّافِیْ لَا شِفَائ اِلَّا شِفَاءُکَ شِفَائً لَا یُغَادِرُ سَقَمًا

‘O Lord of mankind! Remove my illness and cure me. Only You can cure and there is no cure except through You. Such a cure which leaves behind no disease.’”

(Sira Al-Sahaba, Vol. 2, p. 225, Dar-ul-Isha‘at, Karachi)

So those people who go to mystics and mendicants, who spend their entire day intoxicated, not offering a single prayer, they go to them to make use of charms and amulets and then they claim that they have been cured and have been bestowed a great favour, or they have now been granted offspring, or such and such has happened as result; this is the answer to all those things.