Our attitude towards rumours and news on the Internet

 

How should we deal with the rumours that appear on the Internet? What is the Muslim’s attitude towards the news that we read here and there, and what is written in chat rooms, especially since some of it is good news for the Muslims, but the source is unknown.

Praise be to Allaah.
 

 

We live nowadays at a time when many rumours that bring hope
are appearing in the guise of news. These appears on Internet web sites and
chat rooms, so that they may be spread to the people as glad tidings and so
that good-hearted people may accept them as indisputable facts coming from
trustworthy sources. Even if any of them could be proven, there are still
many rumours that can be classed as no more than fabrications. The one who
thinks about this will understand that many of the global media, including
the Arab media, exaggerate in their coverage of some events and they analyze
them in a subjective manner that shows a complete bias and evident absence
of objectivity, trying to take revenge by adding to the news and
exaggerating, and telling weird news stories. So there is no such thing as
credibility in these media, especially when emotions and wishes play a part.
This is apart from the fact that media objectivity has become a victim of
this current war, and western circles have rejected the lessons [of
objectivity, etc.] that they used to teach others. But this does not mean
that we should dispute the facts or deny what is taking place in reality, or
that we should face this bias with exaggeration and hopes. 

Here we should pause and remind ourselves, and the
good-hearted people who hear this news and tell it to others with good
intentions – and those who fabricate these rumours and take upon themselves
the job of propagating them – of a few facts.  

1 – We must be certain
about the news we accept, and we should not accept it simply because it
happens to coincide with our hopes and wishes. We have our own methodology
of verifying matters, and we should be consistent with regard to what we
like and dislike. It is not right for us to doubt news accompanied by
pictures from the battlefield, or to shed doubts on it, when the bottom line
is one’s senses. At a time when you see news going around through mobiles
from some internet web sites, there are some people who may accept such news
but it should be noted that there are people who will never believe it. So
they should beware of exposing themselves to being called liars. An old
proverb says, “Whoever pursues weird news will be disbelieved.” 

2 – We have to be cautious about the fact that the source is
anonymous. There is no information more important than that of the Sunnah of
the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him), yet despite
that it is not part of the Muslims’ methodology to accept reports of the
Sunnah from people who are unknown. Hence news must be taken from authentic
sources; if it is not authentic then it should at least be known, so that
people may be able to find out for themselves whether it is authentic or
not. What a bad habit it is for a man to say, “I heard” or “they said.” 

3 – If there are people who permit the fabrication of
rumours, basing that on some kind of ijtihaad, we must refuse to be the
means of transmitting that by believing it and propagating it. (Whoever
narrates a saying knowing it to be a lie is one of the liars). 

4 – One of the reasons used by the fabricators to justify
making up these rumours is that it is a kind of lying in war, which is
permissible. They ignore the fact – of which they are not ignorant – that
the only kind of lying that is permitted in war is that which misleads the
enemy, not that which creates illusions and deceives the Muslims. 

5 – If we have lost some aspects of the battle, we must not
lose truthfulness which is our capital in our dealings with others. People
will be astounded and amazed if they find out that this false news was
transmitted through a good man. Whoever is known to have lied or to have
transmitted lies will no longer be in a position to be considered
trustworthy.

 6 – Similarly the righteous will be astounded and will
become suspicious of a narrator who appeared to be righteous because he was
telling this news and confirming it to them. At the same time, others will
express joy, those who took the opposite stance to these youngsters and
said, “This is their news, this is their credibility!” Everyone who was
upset by the Muslim revival will find an opportunity to generalize this
mistake and accuse all the pioneers of the revival of behaving like that.
Please, for Allaah’s sake, do not make the enemy rejoice or give them a
reason to attack. 

7 – If truthfulness is an Islamic virtue and part of Arabic
chivalry, then telling lies is an obscenity that Islam has forbidden. Even
the mushrik Arabs refrained from telling lies, as Abu Sufyaan – when he was
still a mushrik – said: “Were it not that I am afraid that people may find
out that I had told a lie, I would have told lies about him.” That was when
he was speaking to Heraclius (about the Prophet (peace and blessings of
Allaah be upon him)). He did not want to have even one lie to be found in
his history, even if it was a lie told against his enemy Muhammad
(peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) to Heraclius (the Roman ruler).
We are concerned that the propagation of these rumours may lead people to
record a lot of lies against us. 

8 – Fabricating rumours and believing them readily is a form
of escapism in the face of a reality which one dislikes and with which one
does not feel comfortable.  

The soul finds consolation in denying that which it does not
like and in fabricating and disseminating rumours, but in the end it will
have to submit to the authority of overwhelming reality. But this
psychological trick is not fit to be the means of escapism for the followers
of Muhammad (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him), who taught
them the virtues of truthfulness and commanded them to strive their utmost
to be truthful. He said: “Truthfulness leads to righteousness and
righteousness leads to Paradise. A man will continue to speak the truth and
strive to be truthful, until he will be recorded with Allaah as a speaker of
the truth. And lying leads to immorality and immorality leads to Hell, a man
will continue to tell lies and strive in telling lies, until he will be
recorded with Allaah as a liar.” 

9 – Delaying recognition of realities and veiling reality
with illusions, the greatest form of which is believing and disseminating
rumours, will only multiply the amount of losses, and the greatest loss will
be the loss of values. The highest and most precious of those values is
truthfulness. “then if they had been true to Allaah, it would have been
better for them” [Muhammad 47:21 – interpretation of the meaning]

 10 – Recognizing the truth is the first step towards dealing
with crises and overcoming them, but not admitting them and concealing them
are among the greatest means of reinforcing them, renewing them and
repeating them.

 11 – Our advice is not to transmit this news. We must advise
those who transmit it with the best of intentions and present them with the
real facts, we should not try to spare their feelings at the expense of our
reason and the transmission of truthful news, and we should try to rescue
them from the anxiety of illusion and point them in the direction of
reality, because truthfulness brings peace of mind and lies bring suspicion.

 12 – Sayyid Qutub (may Allaah have mercy on him) said: “The
reality of a thing defeats the outward appearance of another thing, even if
it is the reality of kufr.” 

How I wish that I did not have to talk in this manner, but
the problem is there and must be addressed. I have tried to be truthful when
speaking about truthfulness, for the dearest of speech to Allaah is that
which is most sincere. 

“O you who believe! Be afraid of Allaah, and be with those
who are true (in words and deeds)”

[al-Tawbah 9:119 – interpretation of the meaning] 

O Allaah, show us the truth as truth and enable us to follow
it; show us the false as false and enable us to avoid it. Guide us
concerning disputed matters of truth by Your leave, for You guide Whomsoever
You wish to the Straight Path. 

May Allaah send blessings and peace upon our Prophet Muhammd
and upon his family and companions. 

Now days we as Muslims have to spread the voice to learn quran and so we could gain the true knowledge and the quran teaching that is give to us by our beloved prophet Muhammad peace be upon him and do quran reading. Do we as Muslim ask our self that why we are at the peak of destruction? The answer will be simple that we have left our roots the holy quran we should guide promote Islam from in our homes first and let learn our kids quran  and encourage them in doing quran memorization this should be our first goal for it we can do different stuff like let then participate in different online quran recitation competition to let them listen quran from different online quran reciters and along with it we elders should learn quran also and improve our knowledge of quran and Islam and learn holy quran tafseer because to understand and learn quran Arabic and for this now a days there are many online quran tutor available who teach tajweed quran and its translation and tafseer so let us join our hands to be the voice of Islam and let improve the image of it as well and full fill our duty .

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------