f) The last contextual indicator we can cite is by employing another principle from legal theory on the narrations themselves. We have narrations that absolutely prohibit musical instruments, while another set of narration prohibits them based on lahw. Based on discussions in legal theory, this is a simple reconciliation where we can restrict the absolute … Read more

We have been discussing whether these narrations are considering musical instruments on their own prohibited in an absolute manner, or are they speaking about it from the perspective of lahw. Although we have very briefly gone over this discussion in the previous lesson, in this lesson we will summarize some of the points and reiterate … Read more

The question we have been trying to answer regarding the narrations is whether they are addressing musical instruments from the perspective of lahw, or in an absolute way. In other words, for example, is the drum prohibited only when used in entertainment parties, or even in wars? We addressed this briefly in our previous lesson, … Read more

In this lesson, we will look at just a few reports jurists entertain when discussing the subject of musical instruments. We will not go through all of them as there are many, some saying there are around forty narrations. Before we get into those narrations, we want to organize them categorically. For students who are … Read more

In our previous lesson, we said that the intellect does not directly comment or give a judgement on specific musical instruments. However, if we consider musical instruments under a certain category which the intellect deems to be detested, then it may be possible to deem it impermissible. Nevertheless, we saw that these categories, such as … Read more

Our jurists generally begin their discussions based on the narrations, whereas we have reiterated many times that a discussion should begin with the intellect, then the Quran, and then eventually the hadith. We have explained this order in other discussions. Many jurists think since we have a plethora of narrations on numerous topics from the … Read more

These are transcripts from 12 advanced jurisprudence lessons given on singing (al-ghinā’) by Ustad Soroush Mahallati. These lessons were given during the Norouz holidays of March, 2022. A discussion on singing and musical instruments given by Ayatullah Sayyid Khamenei was also published on Iqra Online in 2018 which can be read here [Part 1, Part … Read more