Q. The family is organizing a walima at a restaurant for the sake of facility of serving. The restaurant caters for vegetarian and non-vegetarian food and have Muslim and non-Muslim staff. Since the non-Muslim staff is quite strict in respecting the vegetarian norm, the family is saying that there is no harm in eating there as we will provide the restaurant with the chicken and meat and they won’t use haraam ingredients. So just like we buy normal groceries e.g. milk, weetabix, biscuits which are prepared mostly under the supervision of non-Muslim, this, too, should be permissible. Please advise! A. A waleemah is a Sacred Sunnat Act. Rasoolullah (Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam) had taught his Ummat the Deen which Allah Ta’ala is pleased with. Thus, in fulfilling the Sunnat of Waleemah, the method and approach of Rasoolullah (Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam) shall be abided by.
A restaurant is not a sacred place. It is in fact a location of many flagrant haraam acts and unhygienic practices. The Sunnah-style Waleemah cannot be enacted in restaurant precincts. It is unbecoming of Muslims to subject the Sunnah Waleemah to such unholy surroundings.
The issue of the meat and food being halaal or haraam is separate. The issue at stake here is the decidedly un-Islamic set up of this “waleemah”.
Furthermore, the restaurant is in the “worst of places” according to the Hadeeth; the shopping area (sooq). It is therefore not permissible to cloak the sacred institution of the Waleemah with the un-Islamic surroundings of the restaurant. And Allah Ta’ala knows best.
