Cropped Videos and Distorted Statements
The Distortion of the "His Mother's Knee" Remark
Out of context
Claim
Fact
The recording on which the claim rests is a lesson dated 29 April 2011. Seven years later, in 2018, a few sentences taken from the middle of that lesson were put into circulation as though they were a newly made speech.
The subject of the passage that was cut out is the limit of 'awrah: the juristic measure that determines who may look at which part of whom. The measure is not specific to mothers; the same limit applies between two men as well. In Kuytul's own words:
"Never mind a mother — a man may not look at another man between the knee and the navel."
This is a ruling agreed upon by all four schools of law, resting on narrations in the hadith sources which state that the thigh counts as 'awrah. That is, what we have here is not an opinion advanced about mothers but a measure of modesty that applies to everyone.
And the one thing those who made the news story did not do was to ask about this; as Kuytul says, had they been sincere they would first have asked other scholars, or the Directorate of Religious Affairs, about the ruling.
Why is this labelled "Out of context"?
Because the sentences were not invented: they really were said, and the recording is there. Rather than deny this, we write it plainly.
What was cut away is not the sentences but what the sentences were about. The exposition of a ruling in a lesson on jurisprudence was presented as a personal opinion. What is more, Kuytul had already rejected the generalisation laid on him in so many words: "I did not say that everyone who sees above his mother's knee is aroused; that is of course wrong." What he said is that the possibility is not zero, and that the ruling is a precaution against that possibility.
The recording is from 2011, the news story from 2018
The lesson from which the circulated excerpt was taken is dated 29 April 2011. The excerpt was shared seven years later, in 2018, as though it were a newly made statement. That alone is a step of distortion: when the date of a speech becomes invisible, the reader takes it for a current intervention and produces his own answer to the question "why did he say such a thing now".
The second operation is the selection of the sentences. Only a few sentences were taken out of the exposition, and the subject within which those sentences occurred was not left in the excerpt.
What does the passage that was cut out say?
The subject is 'awrah: the juristic limit determining which part of the body must be covered in whose presence. Kuytul is not conveying his own opinion here but a ruling agreed upon by all four schools of law. Its basis is the narrations stating that the thigh — that is, the area between navel and knee — counts as 'awrah (Bukhari, Salat 12; Tirmidhi, Adab 40). The narration addressed to Ali, that neither the thigh of the living nor of the dead should be looked at, sets the same limit (Abu Dawud, Hammam 1).
That is, this is not a guess or a psychological interpretation but a description of a limit found in every one of the classical books of jurisprudence.
The ruling is not specific to mothers
This is the point the claim conceals most. The limit described is not a special ruling about the relationship between mother and son; the same limit applies between two men as well:
"Never mind a mother — a man may not look at another man between the knee and the navel."
Since the measure works the same for everyone, the matter is not a remark made about mothers but a general measure of modesty. When this information is removed from the excerpt, all that is left is a sentence that mentions mothers, and that sentence comes to carry a meaning it never carried.
The generalisation Kuytul rejected
Kuytul also rejected the meaning laid on him explicitly, in his statement:
"I did not say that everyone who sees above his mother's knee is aroused. That is of course wrong. But even if it is one per cent, Islam takes a precaution."
The difference between these two sentences is the whole ground on which the claim stands. To say "everyone is like this" is a generalisation; to say "the possibility is not zero, and that is why a limit has been set" is a ruling of precaution. The logic of the ruling is not to take the exception for the rule but to protect the rule against the exception.
In the same statement Kuytul said that the objection of those who call this ruling perverse is in fact directed not at him but at the source of the ruling. And indeed, if the words at issue had been his own finding, the question to ask would be "is he telling the truth"; because the ruling is the shared position of the schools of law, the question turns into "what is its source", and the answer can be found in a minute.
The question that was not asked
The step those who made the news story skipped was the cheapest form of verification: is this ruling really so? In Kuytul's words, had they been sincere they would have had to ask other scholars first, or the Directorate of Religious Affairs. The correctness of a juristic ruling does not depend on the statement of one person; it can be looked up in any manual of religious practice.
The function of the excerpt is precisely to prevent this. When sentences are presented as one person's claim, the argument shifts onto that person's intentions; the source of the ruling is not asked about, and because it is not asked about it stays invisible.
How excerpts of this kind are produced is explained under a separate heading: Cutting a sentence off in the middle: how are clipped videos produced?