Yusuf al-Qaradawi

Yusuf al-Qaradawi (Arabic: يُوسُفُ الْقَرَضَاوِي, romanized: Yūsuf al-Qaraḍāwī; 9 September 1926 – 26 September 2022) was an Egyptian-born Qatari Islamic scholar. He spent most of his life in Doha, Qatar. He is the chairman of the International Union of Muslim Scholars.^[1]

Yusuf al-Qaradawi at the Third Annual Doha Educational Conference in Doha in February 2006

He is best known for his programme, al-Sharīʿa wa al-Ḥayāh ("Sharia and Life"), broadcast on Al Jazeera, which has an audience of 60 million worldwide.^[2][3] He is also well known for IslamOnline, a popular website he helped found in 1997 and for which he now serves as chief religious scholar.^[4]

Views

He views music as permissible, and listens to it himself,^[5] he permits acting on movie sets and condemns those who withdraw from acting,^[6] believes mortgages are permissible,^[7] and shaving the beard to be makruh.^[8]

Criticism

Shaykh al-Albani: He was criticised for having a very dangerous philosophy and passing verdicts that contradict the sharia, such as how he permitted music by Shaykh al-Albani.^[9]

Shaykh Fawzan: He released a book called refuting Qaradawi's book "Al-Halal wal-Haram" where he is very lax.^[10]