As for the fabricated saying that was purported to have come from the tongue of the selected prophet Mohammad (cpth), which states, “learn magic but do not practice it”: it is surely false and baseless because:
The Noble Qur’an confirms that learning magic is only for devils. It is considered to be a betrayal of the Almighty. This is found in the verse saying: “…but it is devils who had disbelieved (in God). They teach people witchcraft…”
The Holy Qur’an,
Fortress 2, Al-Baqara (The Cow), verse 102
So, would he (cpth) then contravene the saying of Al’lah by inviting his companions to take Satan as a teacher?! God forbid! It is absolutely far from him.
Satan does not instruct except with evil and enormity; as God says: “…and do not walk in Satan’s footsteps, for he is obviously your sworn enemy; he enjoins you to commit evil and atrocity and to assert about Al’lah what you do not know.”
The Holy Qur’an,
Fortress 2, Al-Baqara (The Cow), verse 168-169
To see through this fabricated saying which was untruthfully ascribed to our prophet (cpth), it suffices us to know that learning magic requires one to commit serious offenses and sins, to disrespect Al’lah’s grace, to waste water uselessly instead of making use of it,[19] and to travel in spirit at night with the aim of meeting devils of jinn through one’s imagination so as to do deals with them. Would the messenger (cpth) command anyone to commit evil and acts of atrocity?! It is impossible for him to do so; he is incapable of this.
Saying that the messenger (cpth) ordained for us to learn magic means that Al’lah is the Issuer of this command, as the messenger is the one who informs us of God’s Speech. God says of him: “He does not speak out of his own inclination; this is but an inspired revelation.”
The Holy Qur’an,
Fortress 53, An-Najm (The Star), verse 3-4
Thus, when Al’lah gives His messenger an order, it must be obeyed, as one who obeys the messenger has really obeyed Al’lah. God says: “…would he enjoin you to be unbelievers after you have surrendered yourselves to Al’lah?!”
The Holy Qur’an,
Fortress 3, Al ‘Imran (The Family of ‘Imran), verse 80
So, should we perpetrate abomination and depravity in order to learn magic?!
The Holy Qur’an refutes such impudence towards Al’lah’s presence and towards His messenger in His Noble saying: “Al’lah enjoins justice, kindness and charity to one’s relatives, and forbids indecency, abomination and oppression…”
The Holy Qur’an,
Fortress 16, An-Nahl (The Bees), verse 90
And further, “…He doesn’t accept disbelief from those who are obedient to Him…”
The Holy Qur’an,
Fortress 39, Az-Zumar (The Groups), verse 7
What kind of science is magic? Does not Al’lah say: “…and indeed they learn what harms them and not what benefits them, although they knew full well that anyone who engaged in that traffic (magic) would have no share created for them in the life to come”? Doesn’t it destroy its practitioner, leading them into hellfire in the afterlife?! Does the messenger (cpth), then, invite us to attain such science?!
It would be impossible for him to instruct, or even to permit, the learning of magic, even though a biased person with evil intentions interposed the false statement: “learn it, but don’t practice it”, saying that this was one of the prophet’s sayings (cpth) in order to make magic acceptable to people’s minds. On the other hand, the noble verses show the untruthfulness of this claim and the prophet’s blamelessness in this, and his lack of responsibility for saying what they claim that he said, for this science is obtained from the devils of mankind and jinn-kind, and unquestionably, our prophet (cpth) never urged us to learn it.
God says: “…and they did not teach anyone…”: herein meaning the devils of humankind and jinn-kind, and God told us that they said: “…we (the magicians) are only here as a trial for you (testing your faith), so do not be unbelievers...”: the devils tell us that we will get great benefits by following them, and that we should not separate ourselves from them for this reason. They are trying to capture the people who are naïve and those whom they have deceived by making them think that they are some of Al’lah’s Saints, or that they are people who are attracted by God’s love. They seek to make their targets fall into the commission of sin and forbidden acts. Then, if their prey fail to respond to them as they hope, they say: “…we are only here as a trial for you …”: that is: they were only seducing people as a test to see whether they were steady on the path of righteousness, because they would not want you to become unbelievers.
It is said that when the victims of these magicians do not fall into committing sins, then they diversify the malicious and cunning wiles that they use against these victims, until they fall into sin because of one of these other methods. Here: “…Yet, they learn from them both…”: refers to the devils of humankind and jinn-kind, and “…the means to sow discord between husband and wife…”: refers to the ways that they seduce them and make them fall into sin, sowing division between married couples and destroying families, and causing misery for children. God says: “…However, they can never harm anyone with it without Al’lah’s permission…”: since the only true agent is Al’lah. Accordingly, if a person is upright, magic will never have any sway over them, for it only strikes wrongdoers who are deserving of it, whereas Satan can never cause harm or give a false impression to one who always turns to Al’lah for refuge – as we have already revealed. Al’lah says: “…Satan’s scheming is weak indeed.”
The Holy Qur’an,
Fortress 4, An-Nisa’ (Women), verse 76
This will soon be illustrated through the coming passages.
The messenger (cpth) dealt with magic and magicians in many of his noble sayings, which warned people about them in whatever shape they take.
Below, we mention a very small number of his noble sayings.
“He who comes as a foreteller or a diviner,[20] believing in what he is saying, has stopped believing in what was revealed to Mohammad”.
“He that learns science from the stars has learnt a branch of magic”.
“O, Ali, do not sit with people who claim to have knowledge by means of the stars”.
“Driving away birds and seeing good omens in their voices and names, pessimism, and geomancy are all brought by Jibt.”[21]
Pessimism is that which prevents one who is struck with it from taking action, and geomancy is throwing stones or making traces in sand and reading the future in this way. These are the tricks of diviners. All of these are things which are attained through devils; we can see that the companion Ibn Ab’bas (may Al’lah be pleased with him) said, “Al-Jibt is everything brought about by means of Satan”. These honorable words refer to all sorts of conjuring and magic, like soothsaying by reading cups, fortune-telling, conjuration, the use of talismans and charms, astrology, and augury.
One should stay away from these deeds and refuse to deal with those who practice them. This is the best way to forestall magic and will lead to the most extreme exclusion of magicians, and means absolutely turning away from everything that could lead to the forbidden acts of magic, either directly or indirectly.
Thus, the currency of false sayings supports the spreading of these magicians, and destroys the basis of the nation by making religion falsely and untruly become an opium of the people.
The only aim of the enchanter is to earn money through stealing from naive people by seeming to them to be a foreteller of invisible affairs who can unveil the secrets of metaphysical matters (by means of necromancy, reading cups, astrology, etc.), and seeming to solve their problems, such as dealing with separation or making peace between married couples.
The magician often appears in the capacity of a spiritual doctor or a hypnotist who tries to cure people’s diseases by giving false impressions and talismans, and creating spiritual effects through satanic recitations, robbing people’s money after dominating them with charlatanism.