One of the strangest signs of ignorance of the sunnah is that some later Qur-an exegetes cited these flimsy reports to permit praying in a cemetery, intending thereby to draw strength from the spirit of the deceased or to obtain some residual benefit from his acts of worship—so they claim—without actually venerating him or facing toward him! Besides the fact that these reports contain no proof for the permissibility they assert, their view clashes with the general evidences that forbid prayer in a graveyard or in mosques erected over graves. For this reason al-Manawi dismissed the exegete’s argument, saying: “Yet the report transmitted by the two Shaykhs (Bukhari and Muslim) establishes an unconditional prohibition of building a mosque upon graves. The graves meant are those of Muslims, lest the buried person come to be worshipped, as is indicated by the hadith: ‘O Allah, do not make my grave an idol that is worshipped.’ ” Al-San‘ani likewise refuted him in Sabil al-Salam (2/214): “Concerning his claim, ‘not out of veneration for him,’ we reply that seeking blessing (tabarruk) through him is itself an act of veneration. Moreover, the hadiths forbidding this practice are unrestricted, and there is no evidence for the rationale he supplied. The apparent reason for the ban is to block the means (sadd al-dhari‘a) and to prevent resemblance to idol-worshippers who exalt lifeless objects that can neither benefit nor harm. It also entails wasting money on something frivolous and profligate that yields no benefit whatsoever, and it becomes a pretext for lighting lamps on graves—an act whose perpetrator is cursed. The evils arising from the shrines and domes erected over graves are beyond calculation.” I add: His phrase “whose perpetrator is cursed” alludes to the hadith of Ibn ‘Abbas, the weakness of which I have already demonstrated (p. 39); take note.