—the one known as a shrine—over a genuine grave. What, then, when many of these shrines built over (the graves) (1) of prophets and righteous people—including Companions, members of the Prophet’s family, and others—are fabrications? Many others are disputed, with no reliable transmitted report establishing them. This is true of those found in Syria, Iraq, Khurāsān, and elsewhere.

The reason for the uncertainty surrounding them and the extensive disagreement over them is that Allah preserved the religion with which He sent His Messenger, as He says:

“Indeed, it is We who sent down the Reminder, and indeed, We will surely preserve it.”

[Surah al-Hijr: 9]

Taking these places as sites of worship is not part of the religion. Allah therefore did not preserve the identity of these sacred sites and shrines. Rather, the entire affair surrounding them rests on ignorance and misguidance. Those associated with them rely only on dreams originating from devils or on (reports that are either) (2) fabricated or transmitted from someone whose word carries no authority.

The devils mislead those associated with these sites just as they mislead idol worshippers. At times they speak to them; at times they appear before them; at times they fulfill some of their needs; and at times they shriek, move the chains from which the lamps are suspended, and extinguish the lamps. At other times they do yet other things, as happens in the worship of the idols once possessed by the Arabs. Today they do the same at the idols of the Turks, the Chinese, Black peoples, and others. People then imagine that it is the deceased person himself or an angel appearing in his likeness, when it is only a devil who has led them into polytheism. The same occurs among worshippers of idols fashioned in human form. This is a vast subject, and this is not the place to examine it exhaustively.] (3).