Recordings › In Depth: Is Music allowed in Islam? | Mufti Abu Layth · 18 Sep 2019 › Segment 4 of 12
Is music with explicit or violent lyrics haram?
hadeeth ahadith ahaadeeth hadis hadees ahaadith al-bukhari imam bukhari sahih al-bukhari sahih bukhari saheeh al-bukhari saheeh bukhari imam al-bukhari imaam imams prayer leader ka'bah ka'ba kaabah masjid masjed masaajid masajid muftis hukm ahkam hukum hukam ahkaam haraam mubah mubaah jahannam jahanam jahannum koran quraan al-quran ayah aya ayat ayaat aayah aayat sahabah sahaba sahabi sahabiyyah sahabiyat 'alim aalim ulama ulema ulamaa salam as-salamu alaykum assalamu alaikum assalamualaikum salaam salaams salam alaykum wa alaykum as-salam greetingBut some music is about sex and swearing: Arabic poetry in the Prophet's mosque and Ka'b ibn Zuhayr
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This segment15:47 to 22:21 · 6 min 34 sGeneral teaching
The answer in brief
machinesummary, machine-writtenLyrics do not make music haram: Arabic poetry about sex and alcohol was recited in the Prophet's mosque and is still studied by every scholar, and Ka'b ibn Zuhayr recited his love-opening ode from the Prophet's minbar. Mufti Abu Layth does not promote a culture of violence and drugs but says people can judge content for themselves.
In more detail
An audience member objects that some music swears and is all about sex. Mufti Abu Layth says he does not think that changes anything and does not approve of policing people. Arabic poetry in the Prophet's time was mainly about women, sex and alcohol, yet the same poetry was recited in the Prophet's mosque; a report in Bukhari has the companions spending the night with the Prophet reciting poetry before he said to read some Quran. Imru' al-Qais, deemed the legendary poet, wrote of countless sexual escapades, and the Mu'allaqat, the odes of the pre-Islamic masters, must be studied by anyone who wants to become a scholar of Islam; poetry reigned supreme and stayed so after Islam. He tells of Zuhayr ibn Abi Sulma, whose own verse was about wisdom, and his son Ka'b ibn Zuhayr, who had insulted the Prophet, came to the mosque in fear for his life, was accepted, and recited his poem from the minbar the Prophet gave him; it opens with lines about his beloved who has left him and the chains of his heart before turning to praise of the Prophet. Urdu poetry, by contrast, is modest and about a pure love, whereas classical Arabic poetry is explicit through the Muslim ages. He says lyrics are a separate topic from music: he does not promote a culture of gangs, killing and drug-dealing, but people are intelligent enough to make their own choices and know right from wrong, and it would make no sense to say music is fine but all hip-hop is haram, since music is about the music and not the words. If someone insists it is haram, he adds, he did think of giving that ruling but remembered that he was not God.
Question as read aloud · questioner not identifiedSome music swears and is all about sex; does that not make it haram?
- The question was reconstructed from Mufti Abu Layth's restatement; the questioner's own words are not in the recording
Position stated
Mufti Abu Layth says that lyrics do not make music haram, since Arabic poetry about sex and alcohol was recited in the Prophet's mosque, and that while he does not promote a culture of violence and drugs, people are intelligent enough to judge content for themselves.
“music is to do with the music it's not to do with the words that's a separate matter”
Category: ruling
Kind: general teachingTranscript
machine15:47 to 22:21 · click a time to seek · dotted terms open the glossary
several scholars have said this beginning with from the time of the prophet you've got a hadith in third movie for example the Prophet is walking and somebody's playing a flute and the Prophet says with if not Omar and he puts his you know the Prophet didn't like the music and so he he put his you know it kind of block this thing and it says to Eve not a model of listen tell me when we can't hear it so then if Norma says okay we can't hear it a certain point now this in itself okay some people say oh look what the Prophet didn't like music but that's his personal think you don't like why would he tell somebody to do something forbidden why would he say listen you
listen to and tell me when it stops salted but then people like companions like Hypno's obeyed abdullah venus obeyed he had you know it's known about in fact what a very detailed bath a detail some recent research has been done on it by imam show connie in his name la thought he brings all the chains to do with all the narrations to prohibiting music he brings all the scholars that have said problem that music is permissible and he in the end demonstrated although i don't think he was too pro music himself but he says to be objective we must say that there is no clear text prohibiting music
he says there are all these texts which are highlighted but none of them are conclusive but he himself says look I don't really advise it but I'm just being honest with that with the literature no I don't think so I don't think so because I don't you see you know these policing people like that like I don't think that's like saying to people people say yeah but some kind of music swears in it some kind of music does this in it some kind of music is all about sex some kind of musics all about this yep I saw his poetry in the
time of the Prophet all of Arabic poetry what was it mainly about was about look [ __ ] him sex was it not an alcohol is well sorry no one and leave out the alcohol so and this was the same poetry that they used to sit in the prophet's mosque and it's inside of a hottie they say they spent the whole night with the Prophet reciting the poetry then in the end the Prophet all right now let's read some Quran that's inside body what poetry with a reading of you know dial a Yama I'm sorry not well from the mile apart and all these kind of things this this poetry's begins a moral case was deemed the legend poet of all time all his poetry is all about just having sex with
countless women and stuff like this this is what all these poetry's about so the thing is when you say oh it's about this this is wrong yeah but that's words I understand what you're saying but this is it first of all this is a different topic secondly but this was the in the time the brought in their poetry this was in all of them in fact you cannot become a scholar of Islam without that in that poetry today like we have to study them a la carte we have to study the ten major you know the darn old's that were written in in classical Arabic that actually attach to the Kaaba before of the you know or at least seven or ten the melodic arts of
the dawn poets and some of one of them okay did reach Islam but the but the thing is the others generally didn't they were priests lamb but they they poetry was always reigned supreme and even after Islam comes along what is their poetry still about okay they get some nice you know okay but there were just normal people doing normal things like they look the person what's his name so hated never Selma right he was one of the Simon myelopathy I look at is it's done by the way he's actually isn't so much about sex and stuff he's is actually more about wisdom and stuff like that and it is actually very
awesome he's a lot of wise things in the in sayings and on how to kind of handle the world but his son Caribe Naheed he comes to the prophet's mosque he comes to the prophet and he he was somebody who had previously insulted the Prophet and there was like you know people don't like him so he was worried about his life so he comes to the prophet's mosque and he sits on the member no it comes to prophet and then he removes his it kind of come covered and the prophecies of this is cap and he says look I've come in peace and stuff like that so the Prophet says fine and he says I'd like to read some poetry for you and he reads it and the Prophet actually gives him the member to sit on
and read it and what does it begin with you know where he says Barnett's Allah dhul fiqar belly on my mat poodle moti haiman raha Lemieux stomach Apollo that you know oh he's talking about his girlfriend so odd it begins all she's left me and my heart is all like this today I'm in prison you know like who's gonna open me from these kind of shackles from her and I've been so and then he just speaks about her for so long and then he starts praising and he says and we hear that there's a Messenger of God amongst us and and praises the Prophet and so on and so these things are part and parcel of poetry and language today some
cultures have very much like order poetry is something which is actually very kind of modest it's what in Arabic what we call what they call a laboratory it's like very kind of like it's like a pure non-asexual kind of like love so it doesn't speak so much about the sexuality and so it's more about the praise your beauty and things like all the poetry is mainly like that but Arabic poetry hell no it's I mean especially the classical poetry and right through the Muslim era in the ages and major poets of Islam and they were
all this open they're the ones who love apart from I know some people like obviously people don't say but the people don't study Arabic like that today and but anyway so so I don't agree on that I think people know what's right what's wrong I don't promote this kind of culture of this music of you know gang banging and killing and doing all these kind of drug dealing and no you know this kind of like culture of going about like shooting people and doing this and doing that and this culture I do not promote that and so the thing is but I think people are intelligent enough to make their own choices you don't need to say to people but people know what's right
they know what's wrong they look if they can talk about biote they can listen to it and they know this is wrong they know that's wrong so if that answers if that answers that but I don't think like to say so for example music is okay but all hip-hop music is Haram like I don't think that that's that that wouldn't make sense do taking that like music is to do with the music it's not to do with the words that's a separate matter
obviously if somebody's say it's Haram you see I did think that but I did think of giving that ruling but then I just remembered that I wasn't God you see this is the this is the audacity that we think we can change God's law because we think it's bad how about do you think God doesn't know his people so if God didn't make it Haram who are we to make it Haram Allah says what a typhoon really matters in for alternative
Paragraphs overlapping 15:47 to 22:21. Full text on the recording page.
Cite this segment
Stable id, transcript version and tier are part of the citation. Every change to a transcript is logged.Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment 2019-09-18-S04, auto-transcribed, may contain errors. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/axxub9lxfoc/s/4/ (accessed 1 November 2026)
- APA 7
Mufti Abu Layth. (2019, September 18). Is music with explicit or violent lyrics haram? [Video, segment 2019-09-18-S04, auto-transcribed, may contain errors]. Mufti Abu Layth Archive. Retrieved November 1, 2026, from https://muftiabulayth.org/r/axxub9lxfoc/s/4/
- Chicago author-date
Mufti Abu Layth. 2019. "Is music with explicit or violent lyrics haram?" Video, segment 2019-09-18-S04, auto-transcribed, may contain errors. Mufti Abu Layth Archive. Recorded September 18, 2019. Accessed November 1, 2026. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/axxub9lxfoc/s/4/
- BibTeX
@misc{abulayth-2019-09-18-S04, author = {Mufti Abu Layth}, title = {{Is music with explicit or violent lyrics haram?}}, year = {2019}, month = {9}, date = {2019-09-18}, howpublished = {\url{https://muftiabulayth.org/r/axxub9lxfoc/s/4/}}, url = {https://muftiabulayth.org/r/axxub9lxfoc/s/4/}, organization = {Mufti Abu Layth Archive}, urldate = {2026-11-01}, note = {Segment 2019-09-18-S04, auto-transcribed, may contain errors} }
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