a shadow: it has no face, no eyes, no nose, and no mouth. All it possesses are two hands, two feet, and an elongated head with no internal features. Such figures, God willing, are unobjectionable, the angels do not refrain from entering a house where they are kept, and the little girl can play with them instead of more realistic dolls.

Whoever encounters an unlawful image is obliged to efface it. ʿAlī, may Allah be pleased with him, said to Abū l-Hayyāj al-Asadī: “Shall I not dispatch you on the same mission for which the Messenger of Allah—peace and blessings be upon him—sent me: that you leave no image without erasing it and no raised grave without leveling it?”

A “raised grave” means one that stands out from the other graves, whether by its height or by the elevation of the stones set upon it. For this reason, we must beware of what some people do nowadays: they pour a concrete casing over the grave and sometimes inscribe Qur’anic verses or the like on it. It is impermissible to let this stand, for it constitutes a raised grave. Whoever comes across such a structure—may Allah reward him—should dig around it, lower it, and place any inscription face-down so that it is buried under the soil. All graves ought to remain on a single level, with nothing that suggests veneration, for the root of all calamity—namely, idolatry—lies in the glorification of graves. We ask Allah to protect us and you; indeed, He is able to do all things.

As for newspapers that contain photographs: if you bought them for the pictures, that is forbidden; but if you bought them for the information they carry, there is no harm in that.