Warning against an innovated gathering after someone’s death

All Praise is due to Allah. There is no doubt that the best guidance is the guidance of the Prophet ﷺ, and that every innovation that came after him in the religion of Allah the Most-High is misguidance, as the Prophet ﷺ said in his general and comprehensive saying: “Every bid’ah (innovation in the religion) is misguidance.” And these innovations that were introduced when a person dies - in these events for which people gather, and they introduce what they introduce of foods, as well as recitations - all of these things are innovations that must be prohibited and warned against. Rather what the afflicted one should do is say what the Prophet ﷺ commanded: “O Allah reward me for my calamity and bring me something better in exchange.” For if he says that, Allah will reward him in his calamity and exchange for him something better, as has occurred on several occasions, from the most clear and prominent of which was what happened to the Mother of the Believers, Umm Salamah, (may Allah be pleased with her), when her husband Abu Salama died, and she loved him very much, and she had heard that the Prophet ﷺ said: “There is no believer who is afflicted with a calamity and says, ‘O Allah reward me for my calamity and bring me something better in exchange,’ except that Allah will reward him for his calamity and exchange for him something better.” She was at the time of being afflicted by the death of Abu Salamah so she said that out of complete faith in the speech of the Prophet ﷺ. But still she said to herself: Who is better than Abu Salamah?! Once her ‘Idda’ finished, the Prophet ﷺ proposed to her, and the Prophet ﷺ was better for her than Abu Salamah, may Allah be pleased with her. This is what a person is commanded to do. As for doing a “Khatma” (reciting the entire Quran and giving the reward to the deceased one), then this goes back to an issue where the scholars differed, which is the issue of giving the reward of acts of obedience to the dead. The people of knowledge agreed on the permissibility of giving the reward of certain acts of obedience, but they differed on the other ones. From the things that they differed on is giving the reward of reciting the Qur’an to the dead, does it reach the dead or not? However regarding what these people do by bringing a reciter who is paid a wage, then the reward definitely does not reach the dead. This is because the man who recites is only reciting to obtain a benefit of the Dunya (worldly-life). So, his work is not sincerely for Allah, and if worship is not purely for Allah, then it is not accepted, and if it is not accepted, then the dead does not benefit from it. Based on this, if they hire someone to recite the Qur’an for this dead person, then the wage is invalid, and the reward of the deed does not reach the dead. That is if we say that there is a reward. But we do not say that there is a reward because the action is not done purely for the sake of Allah. For indeed Allah has said (the meaning of which is): “Whosoever desires the life of this world and its glitter, We shall pay them in full for their deeds therein, and they will not be reduced anything therein. They are those for whom there is nothing in the Hereafter except Fire, the deeds they did in this life are fruitless, and of no effect is that which they used to do.” [Surah Hūd: 15-16] So, based on this, it is not permissible to hire a man to recite the ‘khatmah’ for the soul of the dead, because this wage agreement is invalid and the reward, if we were to say there is any, does not reach the dead due to the invalidity of the contract. And if there is no reward, as is in-line with the Islamic evidences, then this becomes a financial loss for the family of the dead without producing any benefit for the dead.