A facebook friend wrote this.
Merlin is a young sorcerer who arrives
at the city of Camelot, after his mother
arranges for him to stay with Gaius, the
court physician. He discovers that the
king, Uther Pendragon, has outlawed
magic and has imprisoned the last great dragon deep under the city. The
dragon informs Merlin that he has an
important destiny to protect Uther's
son, Arthur, who will bring forth a great
Kingdom. When he meets Arthur for the
first time he believes that he is arrogant and Arthur views Merlin as subservient,
as Merlin has to keep his magic a secret
or face execution at the hands of Uther. Merlin is a young, remarkably talented
magician who attempts to keep his
powers secret and will one day become
the greatest wizard in the world. He is
also Arthur's servant, protector, and
friend, despite the initial animosity between the two and his occasional
annoyance as Arthur can be rude to
him. He is compassionate and tries to
see the good in all people, doing what
he feels is just. Though Arthur has been
"trained to fight since birth" and is excellent in combat, he is often
vulnerable and Merlin must protect him,
using magic, from harm to fulfill this
legend. Reading stories or watching movies
that contain magic and fantasy involves
things concerning which there are
some reservations. Firstly: They are spreading acts of sihr
(witchcraft) and kufr, to the extent that
they become like ordinary behaviour in
civilized societies; in fact they depict
such things as essential skills for
individuals and societies that can be learned. Merlin was a young boy who used his
magical powers for good while Richard
Rahl (the seeker in ‘The Legend of the
Seeker) was born with magical power
and it actually run in his blood and all
he needed was to learn how to control it. Harry Potter nko?! They often depict the magician as a
good and decent man who does good
and spreads good among the people,
and this is the most dangerous aspect
of the matter, where something evil is
presented as something good, where one no longer objects to it in one’s
heart and no longer feels that magic
and its practitioners are something
abhorrent, and one no longer thinks of
the seriousness of the sin involved
before Allah. So how about when such stories become widespread and
children and youngsters turn to them. It’s cool having a dream of becoming a
wizard of the first order. These negative outcomes have recently
led many western education specialists
to warn against the spread of magic
stories in their societies, and many
schools have banned these books from
their libraries. There have been discussions about them in
parliamentary debates in Britain, after
they discovered some of the dangers
that may result from their becoming
widespread among people. Secondly: In most cases, these stories teach their
readers about types of magic and
sorcery and depict to them some of the
secrets of magic, that make it easy for
any reader to apply them and indulge
in them. This also poses a great danger, because it may lead the reader to try to
put into practice what he has read. It is
not just the matter of reading a story for
fun; rather there is the fear that some of
these stories may influence their
readers so they may be bewitched or harmed because of reading these
incomprehensible words in these
stories. Hence Muslims should beware of
allowing their children to read these
stories, and societies should put a stop
to the spread of this aspect of culture;
they should focus instead on things
that are important and beneficial in terms of science, arts and literature. In Fataawa Noor ‘ala al-Darb by Shaykh
Ibn Baaz (1/192) it says: I hope that you can explain the
prohibition on using and reading
books of magic and astrology, because
there are many such books, and some
of my friends want to buy them, and
they say that if they are not used for harmful purposes, there is nothing
wrong with it. Please advise us, may
Allah bless you. The answer was: In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious,
the Most Merciful. Praise be to Allah, and
blessings and peace be upon the
Messenger of Allah and his family and
Companions, and those who follow him
sincerely … What the questioner says is correct. The
Muslims should beware of books of
magic and astrology, and those who
find them should destroy them,
because they are harmful to the Muslim
and cause him to fall into shirk. The Prophet (blessings and peace of Allah
be upon him) said: “Whoever learns a
branch of astrology has learned a
branch of magic... And Allah says in His
Holy Book about the two angels
(interpretation of the meaning): “but neither of these two (angels) taught
anyone (such things) till they had said,
‘We are for trial, so disbelieve not (by
learning this magic from us)’” [al-
Baqarah 2:102]. This indicates that
learning magic and practising it is kufr. So the Muslim must oppose books
which teach magic and astrology, and
destroy them wherever they are. This is what is required. It is not
permissible for a seeker of knowledge
or anyone else to read them or learn
what is in them. People other than
seekers of knowledge also have no
right to read them or learn what is in them, or to approve of them, because
they lead to disbelief in Allah. What is
required is to destroy them wherever
they are. And the same applies to all
books that teach magic and astrology -
they must be destroyed. End quote. To sum up: Just reading these stories is
not kufr that puts one beyond the pale
of Islam, so long as that is not done
with the aim of learning magic and
practising it. However what is required
is to warn against reading books of magic in general and to strive to
destroy them if possible, and to beware
of reading them or distributing them.