Is there a hadith stating that Allah himself takes the spirits of the students of the religious sciences?

Dear Brother / Sister,

We have not found any information like that in hadith resources.

However, the following is stated in a hadith that is reported to have been weak:

“Allah has appointed the Angel of Death to seize spirits, except for the martyr at sea; for, Allah Himself seizes their spirits." (Ibn Majah, Jihad, 10)

"The spirits of those martyrs come out of their hearts easily like drinking milk.” (Ibn Hajar, al-Asqalani, al-Matalibul-Aliya, 9/223)

As Allah gives spirit to a body and revives it so too does He remove it from that body.  When Allah say, “be”, anything will “be”.

In fact, the archangels like Jibril, Mikail and Azrail have assistants of their own kind and similar to them. Those assistants differ based on their types. Those who remove the spirits of righteous people are different from those who remove the spirits of the people of Hell. As a matter of fact, there are hadiths stating that angels of mercy will remove the spirits of believers and angels of penalty will receive the spirits of unbelievers. (see Nasai, Janaiz 9; Ibn Majah, Jihad, 10; Ibn Kathir, Suyuti, Naziat, interpretation of verses 79/1-2)

Accordingly, the assistants of the angel of death are the angels of mercy and penalty. When a person is about to die, the angels of both mercy and penalty are ready. There are narrations stating their number as four or three angels of mercy and three angels of penalty: altogether six angels. (Hasan al-Idwi, al-Hamzawi, Mashariqul-Anwar, p. 25-26, M. Kastaliyya, 1277 h. and Egypt, 1316)

Those angels appear in a nice way before the believers who are to die and treat them softly. They address the spirit of the believer as follows:

"O satisfied spirit that is in the nice body! Come out! Come out and rejoin your Lord by praising Allah and with His mercy and with glad tidings of nice things." (Sha'rani, Tadhkiratul-Imam, p. 17, Cairo, 1310) 

This glad tiding and the nice appearance of the angels will make the believers forget the agonies of death, which are more severe than blows of sword, and will rejoice them.   

The angels that come to man when he is about to die appear in a terrible way before the unbelievers and address the spirit of the unbeliever as follows:

"O dirty spirit that is in the dirty body! Come out! Come out in a despised state and with bad tidings of Hell!" (see ibid)

This address will continue until the spirit leaves the body.  

In is stated in narrations that as soon as the spirit of the believer is taken by the angel of death, it will be given to the angels of mercy waiting next to him and that it will be raised by them, that the spirit of the unbeliever will be given to the angels of penalty and that the gates of the sky will not be opened for him. As it is indicated in the Quran (see al-Qiyama, 75/27), the angels of mercy and penalty that are present at the time of death will ask each other, "Who will elevate his spirit?" until Allah orders one of them to take his spirit. (Abdullah Sirajuddin, al-Iman bi Awalimil-Akhira, p. 47, Aleppo, 1977)

Indicating that the spirits of the students of the religious sciences are taken by the angels, Badiuzzaman narrates the following incident:

"Once, the angel of death came to take the spirit of a righteous scholar. He suddenly shouted out beseeching the divine court: 'I love students of the religious sciences; so, let the angel charged with taking possession of their spirits take possession of mine.' Those who were present there heard this. Thus, he surrendered his spirit to his Lord.” (see Mektubat, Yirmi Sekizinci Mektup, İkinci Mesle)

The real doer and creator of death is Allah whether the spirits are removed by Azrail or his assistants. He appointed the angel of death (Azrail) to remove the spirits due to His wisdom; some angels that are his assistants are also in charge of removing the spirits. Allah creates death with those means or without any means if He wishes.  What matters is whether we are always ready for the moment of death or not, and whether we lead a life in compliance with that time, which is the most important moment of our life, or not.

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