by Allah, if a beard could be bought with silver coins, we would have purchased one for him so that he might be a complete man.”

Some members of Banu Tamim, from the clan of al-Ahnaf ibn Qays, once said, “I only wish we could buy al-Ahnaf a beard for twenty thousand!” They did not mention his bow-leggedness or the fact that he was blind in one eye; what they deplored was his lack of a beard, for in the eyes of reasonable men, whoever is beardless is deemed deficient.

It is also related that Shurayḥ the Judge said, “I wish I could have a beard even if it cost me ten thousand dirhams.” How astonishing, then, that in our own age there are those who would gladly pay a large sum of money to have their beard removed permanently, simply so they would never again have to face the trouble of shaving!

Shaving the Beard Is a Humiliation
None of the eminent Imams of Islam ever shaved off his beard even once in his life. On the contrary, some princes who lacked sound religious understanding, whenever they wished to discipline a subject for some offense, would shave his beard, mount him on a beast, and parade him among the people to disgrace him. For this reason certain jurists have declared, “It is permissible to chastise someone by shaving his head, but not his beard,” meaning that shaving the beard is unlawful. Do you not see that shaving the head is legislated when leaving from