The Weight of Slanderer

Legal Definition of Slander

A type of defamation. Slander is an untruthful oral (spoken) statement about a person that harms the person's reputation or standing in the community. Because slander is a tort (a civil wrong), the injured person can bring a lawsuit against the person who made the false statement. If the statement is made via broadcast media -- for example, over the radio or on TV -- it is considered libel, rather than slander, because the statement has the potential to reach a very wide audience.

What the Quran Says:

Woe to every slanderer and backbiter.
Al-Humaza 104:1

And whoever earns a fault or a sin and then throws it on to someone innocent, he has indeed burdened himself with falsehood and a manifest sin.
Al-Nisa 4:112

And obey not everyone who swears much, and is considered worthless,
A slanderer, going about with calumnies,
Hinderer of the good, transgressor, sinful,
Cruel, after all that base-born (of illegitimate birth),
Al-Qalam 10:13

He who commits slander will be tortured in their graves, (for slander is a major sin), because the person went about with calumnies (defamation [to make enmity between friends]).