A serious issue I have been wanting to cover was confidentiality in our community, or the lack thereof. It has been happenning repeatedly, that if someone comes and speaks to an Imam about an issue they were having, he would do the Friday khutbah about it the following week. I have nothing against him wanting to teach the public, however, it is embarrassing for the person that came to him. They feel as though they are being exposed and due to the level of detail the Imam describes their situation in, sometimes others can figure out who it was.
To the extent that it has become a sort of guessing game, where everyone is in the other’s business. I have seen it with my own eyes several times, that someone will come to the Imam about an issue and it would be all over the masjid in a matter of days. The reason this happens is because he may allow mosque staff to remain in the office during his talks with people from the community, when these meetings should be private. So, that person tells his wife about what happened and she would tell others and so on and so forth.
Confidentiality isn’t as simple as removing the names and telling the story, because if you aren’t careful, people can put one and one together and figure out who you are talking about. I personally would never tell my issues to the Imam of my local mosque. The trust isn’t there, I am confident that my business would be everyone’s conversation by the end of the same day. Then to top it off some sisters would come and randomly advise me about my weak Iman. Patience is a huge part of dealing with any affliction or test, but just because people are going through a tough time doesn’t mean they have weak faith.
This is a very real problem, it makes people insecure about their issues, because they never know what others know about them. This is one of the things that alienate people from the masjid. One young lady in the community was having difficulties with her family and wanted counseling, but she emphasized that she wasn’t ever going to talk to any Muslims about her issue. She would feel more comfortable speaking with someone external to the Muslim community. There is a huge danger in that the youth will look towards non-Islamic sources for their guidance and advice. Why wouldn’t they? All the local mosque has to offer is criticism and exposing your secret.
Imam Ahmad, at-Tirmidhi, Abu Dawud, and others recorded the hadith of Jaabir, that the Prophet ( صلى الله عليه وسلم ) said: “When a man narrates (hadatha) something, and he (iltafat) turns around, then it is a trust (amaanah).”
Then what if he tells you it is a secret? What if he makes you promise not to tell?
The problem lies in poor manners and people not having the basic knowledge of Islam. Backbiting, spying and slander are among the sins that we are clearly warned against in the Quran. We are too quick to tear down our brothers and sisters when we are sometimes doing worse things than they are. We can be arrogant and want one over on our sister or brother and take joy in bashing them every chance we get.
Grow your beards, roll up your pants, wear niqab, wear hijab read Quran, quote hadith, talk about your jahileyya days, sprinkle your words with Islamic terms, and trash talk other Muslims.
Doesn’t add up does it?
Looking Muslim on the outside isn’t all there is to it.
As-Salaamu ‘alaikum,
It’s really shocking that an imam would do that to someone who had come to him in confidence, and in such a way that people could guess who he meant. It’s another example of the lack of professionalism in the Muslim community, and besides, backbiting anonymously is haraam. If teachers did this, they would face discliplinary action.
It is sad that the current situation is as you mention in some places but we should strive to advice each other about our weakness. Instead of running from the community and let them drown in slandring and non-confidentiality we should improve the situation. Maybe the Imams are not aware how to have strict confidentiality, they are not all knowing and for once we could tell them a thing or two of correct behavious as they always strive to tell us and Allah knows best. Lastly I enjoyed your blog and thanx for highliting this area, I will be on the look out for preach of confidentiality.