“People follow Quraysh in this matter: those who were best in the pre-Islamic era are best in Islam, if they acquire religious understanding. By Allah, were it not that Quraysh might become arrogant, I would tell them what their best possess with Allah.” Aḥmad (4/101) narrated it from Muʿāwiyah ibn Abī Sufyān with an authentic chain of transmission.

I say: These authentic hadiths constitute an explicit refutation of certain deviant sects of old, as well as some contemporary writers and Islamic parties, who do not stipulate that the caliph must be an Arab from Quraysh. More astonishing still is that one of the shaykhs who profess Salafism wrote a treatise entitled The Islamic State, in which he mentioned at the outset the conditions that a caliph must fulfil—yet omitted this condition, disregarding all these hadiths and others conveying the same meaning. When I reminded him of this, he smiled, turning away from discussing the matter. I do not know whether this was because, like those to whom we referred above, he does not regard this as a condition, or because he was not prepared to examine the issue from a scholarly perspective. In either case, every author must be impartial in seeking the truth in all that he writes, and must not be influenced by a partisan orientation or political current, nor commit himself to agreeing with or opposing the majority. Allah is the Granter of success.

1008 — “Any woman who adds someone else’s hair to her own hair is merely adding a falsehood.”

Aḥmad narrated it from Muʿāwiyah through the preceding chain from him. It has many corroborating reports in al-Bukhārī and Muslim and elsewhere. If this is the ruling on a woman who adds another person’s hair to her own, then what is the ruling on a woman who places upon her head a cap made of artificial hair—what is now known as a wig? And consequently, what is the ruling on one who issues a fatwa permitting this for her, whether unconditionally or subject to restrictions, in imitation of certain schools of law, without concern for contradicting the authentic hadiths—even though Allah has guided him to the view that it is a duty to act upon them, even if they contradict his own school, or indeed the other schools? I ask Allah Most High to increase us in guidance upon guidance and to grant us knowledge and piety.