Greeting One Who Shaves His Beard, Answering His Greeting, and the Status of His Children

Question

Question: Here we have a certain respected religious scholar who does not greet with salam — let alone one who shaves his beard — even one who trims his beard, and indeed considers even returning his salam haram. When he was asked, he replied that keeping the beard a fist in length is wajib; one who abandons this commits a major sin (kabira), is a fasiq (sinner)

Answer

Shaving the beard is haram. Trimming it before it reaches a fist’s length, or trimming it so that it becomes shorter than a fist, is not mubah (permissible) according to anyone. In this shaving and trimming there is imitation (tashabbuh) of other peoples. It is also evident that such a person is not one whose testimony is accepted, nor is he ‘adil (upright)

Source: Fatawa Mahmudiyya

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