2

Source: http://islamqa.info/en/115761

narrated by Ahmad in his Musnad and by Abu Dawood in his Sunan with a saheeh isnaad from Umm Salamah (may Allaah be pleased with him) who said: The Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) forbade all kinds of intoxicants and relaxants.

That all kinds of bit seems to tell me that many different types of intoxicants and relaxants were forbidden but not all. If it had said forbade ALL intoxicants and relaxants, that to mean would mean that absolutely ALL intoxicants and relaxants are forbidden. But the above hadith says all kinds of instead of all.

I say this because according to the dictionary, all kinds of roughly means the same thing as all manner of or all sorts of:

Source: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/all+kinds+of

All kinds of: also, all manner or sorts of . All or many varieties of something, as in Before the banquet, they served all kinds of drinks , or He sold exotic fruit of all sorts , or The museum featured all manner of artifacts . [Early 1300s]

So my question is, if all relaxants and intoxicants are not forbidden, which types are not forbidden? i.e. which relaxants and intoxicants were not forbidden by the prophet of islam and/or God when the prophet of islam was alive?

Here are some definitions from Google search:

Intoxicanting: Cause (someone) to lose control of their faculties or behavior.

Relaxants: A drug used to promote relaxation or reduce tension.

Languor: The state or feeling, often pleasant, of tiredness or inertia

Ineria: A tendency to do nothing or to remain unchanged

Improve this question
1
  • You may also want to post this on the English/Language SE website. I do think that all kinds of means all of. Logically, it's saying for every kind of intoxicant => for all intoxicants of any kind
    – user921
    Apr 8, 2015 at 18:13

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
2

There are two general criteria Intoxicant/Relaxants:

  1. It should not cause a person loose the ability to judge right from wrong.
  2. It should not cause addiction, such that if not taken, will drastically effect a person's ability to do daily activities.

For example, tea/coffee does enhance mental ability but it is not addictive. People go about doing their daily activities during Ramazan without a cup of coffee in the morning.

It is also known that different quantities of these kinds of drugs effect every person to a different degree. Thus it is very difficult to defined a "permissible" quantity. A general rule given by scholars is "if a large quantity causes a person to loose control over oneself, then smaller quantity of that is also forbidden".

Based on this reasoning, alcohol is forbidden, although for someone, taking a sip will not effect him in any way.

Improve this answer
3
  • This might be slightly off topic, but according to en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeine_addiction caffeine can be 1. addictive and 2. intoxicating in large quantities. 2 points which you mentioned in your answer. So based on your answer, tea seems to fit in your criteria of forbidden intoxicants... But this is offtopic. I am more interested in which intoxicants relaxants which were not forbidden when the prophet of islam was alive.
    – oshirowanen
    Aug 13, 2013 at 10:54
  • If new research in science proves something to be harmful, then it becomes prohibited. Its where religious and scientific community should collaborate with each other. Personally, I think there is more work to be done by the religious scholars to give a clear criteria about this. Till then each one of us should use his own best judgement.
    – goto
    Aug 13, 2013 at 13:21
  • That makes sence. Also, I'm wondering if the wording issue I described above as in "all kinds of" is a translation issue? Anyone here know arabic who can check if the hadith above has been translated appropriately?
    – oshirowanen
    Aug 13, 2013 at 13:36

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .