It is worth noting that the Prophet ﷺ counted as religious excess the pilgrim’s habit of choosing large stones for the stoning of the jamarāt in Mina; he ordered instead that they be no bigger than the small pebbles used for slinging. Ibn ʿAbbās (may Allah be pleased with them both) reported: “On the morning of al-ʿAqabah the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said to me, ‘Hand me—pick up for me (some stones).’ I collected for him pebbles about the size of those used in a sling. When I had placed them in his hand he said, ‘Like these’—he repeated it three times—‘and beware of excess in religion, for those before you were only destroyed because of excess in religion.’” 1

The Prophet ﷺ regarded the stoning of the pillars as a symbolic act whose aim is to repudiate and combat Satan, not to kill or annihilate him literally. The Muslim is therefore to perform the rite as prescribed and to show enmity toward Satan—the relentless foe of humankind—nothing more.

Despite this stern warning against excess, Muslims have unfortunately fallen into it and followed the ways of the People of the Scripture. One of them even said:

Leave what the Christians claimed about their Prophet;
Then praise him as you wish and judge as you desire.

This poet—venerated by many Muslims, who chant his famous poem, the Burdah, seek blessings through it, and recite it at mawlid gatherings and in some preaching and study circles, counting that as a means of drawing near to Allah Most High and as proof of their love for their Prophet ﷺ—imagined that the prohibition in the aforementioned ḥadīth applied only to the claim that Muhammad ﷺ is the son of Allah. He therefore rejected that statement while inviting people to say anything else about him, no matter what, and this