Muslims celebrating Christmas

24/12/2009| IslamWeb

Question:

Can a Muslim celebrate Christmas? Is there any Aalim who tells that it is Haram to celebrate? If so who? Is there any Fatwa about celebrating Christmas? Is it written in the holy Qur'an about Christmas?

Fatwa:

Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the World; and blessings and peace be upon our Prophet Muhammad and upon all his Family and Companions.

A Muslim should be thankful to Allah for His great blessings upon him. He Who Guided him to the right path. So he should keep on supplicating Allah to make him steadfast on this path which is the path of blessed people and to keeping him away from the path of those who deserve His Anger and of those who went astray.

The Kuffars spare no efforts to draw the Muslims away from the straight path and to cut their relation with their true religion. Allah Says (interpretation of meaning): {Many of the people of the Scripture (Jews and Christians) wish that if they could turn you away as disbelievers after you have believed, out of envy from their ownselves, even, after the truth (that Muhammad is Allâh's Messenger) has become manifest unto them. But forgive and overlook, till Allâh brings His Command. Verily, Allâh is Able to do all things.}[2:109].

We the Muslims are proud of our religion that was revealed to us by Allah and are thankful that Allah has chosen us for his religion.

Allah Says (interpretation of meaning): {… This day, I have perfected your religion for you, completed My Favour upon you, and have chosen for you Islâm as your religion. …}[5:3].

The Kuffars' celebrations such as the second millenium, Christmas Day, etc. are among the falsehoods that a Muslim should avoid. Allah Says (interpretation of meaning): {And those who do not witness falsehood, and if they pass by some evil play or evil talk, they pass by it with dignity.}[25:72].

Many known ancestors made clear that the "falsehood" in the above verse means feasts of Kuffars. Imam Ahmad in his book of Hadith al-Musnad and Imam Tirmizi in his book of Sunan reported on the authority of Anas who said that the Prophet came to Madinah while people there had two days in which they played. The Prophet asked, "What are these two days?" They said, "These are two days we used to play in, in our Jahiliyyah! The Prophet said, "Allah has replaced them with two better days. Eid al-Adha and Eid al-Fitr".

A person came to the Prophet and said: "I have taken a vow to sacrifice a camel at Buwanah. The Prophet (peace be upon him) asked: Did the place contain any idol worshipped in pre-Islamic times? They (the people) said: No. He asked: Was any pre-Islamic festival observed there? They replied: No. The Prophet (peace be upon him) said: Fulfil your vow, for a vow to do an act of disobedience to Allah must not be fulfilled, neither must one do something over which a human being has no control."

No doubt celebrating such feasts is actually imitating unbelievers. The companion of the Prophet Abdullah Bin Amar bin al-'Aas said: 'Whoever celebrates the Persian New Year's Day or their carnival and imitates them till his death he will be resurrected with them on the Day of Judgment'.
The Prophet said as reported in a sound Hadith: "Who imitates non-Muslims he is one of them" [Imams Ahmad and Abu Dawood].

Therefore, a Muslim is neither allowed to celebrate the Christmas Day nor is he allowed to congratulate them. Nor, does a Muslim celebrate any of their other feast days. A Muslim celebrates only the Islamic Eid days.

Many times Allah has mentioned the details of the birth of Jesus in the Qur'an but He did not mention any celebration to be done on this occasion.
Please read the Fatwa: 82006.

 

Allah knows best.

 

Fatwa answered by: The Fatwa Center at Islamweb