Yaser M. Haddara

This is the concluding part in my short series on humor. Having talked about what kind of humor has existed, I wanted to close it out by talking about one perspective on guiding principles in terms of our use of and reaction to humor.

I feel that I have adequately backed up my claims that humor has always been important in Muslim communities and that it was welcomed and appreciated by authoritative figures from the prophet himself, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, downwards. By its very nature humor draws upon life experiences and therefore issues of relationships, sexuality, and gender stereotypes are common fodder for such humor. I have argued that such has pretty much always been the case. But I have also noted that (again very naturally) different individuals may have different tolerance for certain types of humor, and different individuals will react differently to different jokes. Almost by definition humor is idiosyncratic.

Despite these arguments I feel that in humor, as in every other sphere of life, the Islamic ethos imposes certain guidelines for behavior. Different scholars have spoken and written on the subject and the most commonly cited guideline is that one should not lie. Reference is made to the hadeeth of the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, that condemns one who tells a lie to get people to laugh. Having said that, it is clear from the stories that we have seen in the other three posts in this series that the intent here isn’t to be very literal, or to apply to all of us the same standards that applied to the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him. The prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, never spoke a word that wasn’t exactly and actually true. Even when he, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, would joke, it would be by playing on double meanings of words and so on, but such double meanings would all be true. This is not so in the case of, for example, the companion who told a group of people that his friend was really his slave and sold him to them as a practical joke. Clearly, a “lie” was used here. Nonetheless, the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, found the incident funny and saw no harm. This leads me to conclude that the prohibition against lying is the prohibition against making up complete stories and passing them on as the truth - something that people do as a matter of course nowadays. With some people, there is no hesitation to make up entirely false stories about public figures, or friends or colleagues, in order to get a laugh at a gathering or in conversation. Such stories then may be believed and passed around as the truth without further correction from the person that started the slander. Such behavior would definitely come under the prohibition of using lies to elicit laughter. Other situations may also come under that prohibition and we all have to use common sense to distinguish the situations where we would in fact be propagating a lie.

The second prohibition that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, is against striking fear into others to elicit laughter. Some of the companions pulled a prank on one of them by hiding a rope that he owned (apparently something he was in dire need of and would have been at a loss to replace it). When he came back from his errand and could not find his rope he was in a panic and started searching high and low for it. At some point they gave it back to him and all had a good laugh. Nonetheless, when the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, heard the story he disapproved and instructed people that they were prohibited from putting fear into each others’ hearts for any purpose, including humor. Once again, this prohibition needs to be understood according to a common sense standard. I have previously mentioned the story of the companion that wanted to get the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, to laugh and did so by untying the belt that held his saddle to the camel so that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, almost fell off the camel. This was not considered reprehensible, rather it got a good laugh. So there is a line between the acceptable and the unacceptable in this arena and we should exercise care not to cross the line. Figuring out the line is a matter of common sense and genuinely caring how others feel and how they are impacted by what we say or do.

The final area of discussion is the area of propriety or lack thereof. I think it is rather obvious that our values militate against vulgarity in general. This extends both to crass vocabulary and to the kind of teenage humor that has become so commonplace nowadays (I would say in every culture). Having said that, as with most areas of day to day living it is hard to draw a line in the sand that separates the acceptable from the unacceptable. Rather it becomes a matter of culture in the sense of our collective sense of beauty, our collective sense of humor, and our collective shuddering at the saying or doing of certain things. And this makes some things acceptable depending on time, place, context, who’s saying them and to whom, why they’re being said, and how frequently they’re being said. This may be a hard pill to swallow for those of us that would like to have a governing equation for everything in life :) . Nonetheless, I believe a fair reading of history would leave us with the clear conclusion that this has always been the case and that it is both artificial and quite unreasonable to expect it, or to try to force it, to be otherwise.

I will cite two more examples to illustrate my point above and to wrap up this entire discussion. Both come from the authentic sunna.

The first example is of a woman that came to the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, to discuss her situation in marriage. The language of the hadeeth implies that she was sitting in the presence of the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, with other companions present, and some other companions standing outside by the door (perhaps some were waiting for their turn, and perhaps some were just in the masjid but were close enough to the doorway). The woman explained that she had been married to her first husband, who had divorced her three separate times. She had now married her second husband and, she says, “What he has is like the crease of a dress!” A man standing by the door was incensed that the woman would be so forward in the presence of the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him. He called on to some of the folks sitting inside to tell the woman to watch her language! However, none of them spoke, which is appropriate given that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, was right there and could speak for himself very well thank you! He himself, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, merely smiled and told the woman that it sounded like she wanted to go back to her first husband. When the woman confirmed that, the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, clarified the legal ruling in the matter and said, “Not until you taste of his (meaning the 2nd husband) sweetness and he tastes of yours.” I.e. there has to be full marital relations between this woman and her second husband. Then if there is a divorce she would be able to return to her first husband if she so wishes.

The second story concerns a companion by the name of Abu Abdillah Khawwat ibn Jubayr (ra). He narrates that he was once in the travel caravan of the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him. They were encamped close to Makka and he came out into the camp one day and noticed a group of women sitting together. According to his story, he found the women attractive so he went back into his tent, picked out his best suit, wore it, and came out and sat with them! Just at that moment, the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, came out, saw Khawwat (ra), and asked him what he was doing sitting with these women? Given the circumstances, Khawwat (ra) was nervous, and the first thing that came to his mind was to make something up! So he told the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, that he has a camel that often runs off and he had asked the women if they would weave together a rope that he could use to tie down his camel. At that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, said nothing, but went off to make his wudoo (that’s where he’d been headed) and when he came he, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, asked this companion, “So Abu Abdillah! What happened with your rebellious camel?” Realizing that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, had seen through his fib, the man said nothing. When the caravan started on the journey back to Madeena, the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, would repeatedly fall back to come to Abu Abdillah (ra). And every time he did that, or any other time that he encountered him on the journey, he would ask, “Abu Abdillah! What happened with your rebellious camel?” When they returned to Madeena, this would not stop. Every time the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, met Khawwat ibn Jubayr (ra), he would ask him, “Abu Abdillah! What happened with your rebellious camel?” It got so much for this companion that he decided to avoid the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, and he stopped going to the masjid.

As he tells the story he says he missed the masjid. He was longing to be back in the masjid! So he waited one night late until he thought the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, would be in his rooms and he went into town and into the masjid. He stood there and began to pray. And the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, came out into the masjid, prayed two short rak’as, and sat right behind him. He decided to lengthen his prayers in the hope that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, would give up and go. But the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him told him, “You can pray for as long as you wish. I will wait for you.” Hearing this, it was Khawwat (ra) that therefore gave up and concluded his prayers. The prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, immediately asked him, “Abu Abdillah! What happened with your rebellious camel?” Khawwat (ra) confessed, “By the One that sent you with the truth, my camel has never run off since I entered Islam.” The prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, said to him rahimakallah (God give you mercy) twice or three times, then he never spoke of it again.

The point in the two stories relevant to our discussion here is to note what things the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, let slide and what things he would not let slide. The legal ruling for the woman, and the necessity of telling the truth and living with integrity for the man, were far more important than the woman’s forwardness or the man’s spending some time in the company of these women to whom he was attracted. These latter items didn’t even merit a mention from the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him. This doesn’t mean they are acceptable norms for behavior - far from it. The prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, did not condone this behavior here, and has taught what constitutes proper adab in so many different ways elsewhere. But they just weren’t important enough to turn into a big deal in either case! I would hope that we as a community may develop tolerance for the variations in people’s styles, inclinations, expressiveness, and even weaknesses, and that we can distinguish between the trivial and the essential.