the view of Mālik and al-Shāfiʿī, because his rank is beneath that of the martyr. The station of the combatant in Allah’s cause—who deliberately exposes himself to death so that Allah’s word may prevail—has no equal. The Exalted says: “Do not think of those who are killed in the path of Allah as dead; rather, they are alive with their Lord, provided for, rejoicing in what Allah has granted them of His bounty” (Āl ʿImrān 3:169-170). It is therefore unsound to extend the outward rulings applied to them to anyone else, and the hadith cited in support of such an analogy does not establish it.
- The scholars have permitted placing another deceased in the same grave once the first body has decayed and turned to dust. A strong presumption is sufficient, and the judgment is referred to local experts familiar with the cemetery. Burying someone there before the first has decomposed is impermissible, for the dead enjoy inviolability in their graves just as the living do in their homes. The Almighty says: “Have We not made the earth a receptacle—for the living and the dead?” (al-Mursalāt 77:25-26): the living in their dwellings, the dead in their graves.
Shaykh ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Saʿdī said: “Graves are a mercy for them, a covering that prevents their bodies from being exposed to beasts and the like.”
Shaykh Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm Āl al-Shaykh said: “Exhuming graves is impermissible because it is an affront to the dead. Their sanctity is recognised; they reached that spot first and it has become their dwelling. Graves are their homes.”
- Shaykh al-Islam said: It is authentically reported that the Prophet ﷺ declared, “One who drowns, one who is burned, one who dies of an abdominal illness, a woman who dies in childbirth, and the person crushed by a collapsing building are martyrs” (Musnad Aḥmad 23241; Abū Dāwūd 3111).
Al-Iqnāʿ and other works state that there are many martyrs besides the battlefield martyr, among them: one who dies of pleurisy, of an abdominal disease, of plague; one who dies from a venomous sting; one mauled by a wild beast; one who falls from a height; one who is thrown from his mount; one who sincerely seeks martyrdom; the frontier guard; and anyone killed while defending his own life, his family, or his wealth. These are martyrs with respect to the reward of the Hereafter, not in the rulings of washing and the funeral prayer.
Al-Sharḥ al-Kabīr says: “We know of no disagreement on this point.” Ibn al-Qayyim added: “They are to be washed and the funeral prayer is to be offered for them, and there is no dispute about that.”