The mention of 'beard' in ahadith

Question:
I have heard from many people that in the Hanbali fiqh, a beard is legitimate only if it is visible from a considerable distance. Otherwise, it is haram. What is the source of this? Are there any ahadith to this effect?

Many ulema also suggest that keeping a beard is fard, since the Qur'an has required the believers to obey Allah and His Messenger.

I would appreciate your guidance in the matter.

Response:
Indeed we are expected to obey Allah and His messenger. In fact, as far as obedience is concerned, it is practically obedience of the prophet, alaihissalaam, alone that is required. When we obey him, we obey Allah. Thus, when we follow the Qur'an, we follow the Messenger, because it is he who brought the Qur'an, and in the process, we obey Allah. Likewise is the case of religious practices, called sunnah, that have been given to us in addition to the Qur'an. The people who were present at the time of the prophet were required to follow him in all aspects of religion that he would teach them. Those aspects were the Qur'an, Sunnah, the explanation and details of these two sources, and his judgments on whatever disputes were brought to him. No believer had a right to disagree with any of the judgments he made on the issues reported to him. In worldly matters, however, they were not obliged to follow his advice. In some cases, we know that he himself clarified to his companions that they weren't obliged to follow his advice.

In the later times, the obligation of following the messenger required that we first understand that a certain information is actually originating from the prophet or not. One would even need to investigate whether certain meanings of the Qur'anic passage are correct or not. For that, one would need to have proper knowledge first and then one would practice it. There would certainly be differences as a result of this excercise. An individual is expected to follow the understanding that appeals to him the most
convincing. When he is honestly doing it, he is following the prophet.

My understanding is that the mention of beard in ahadith is not making it binding on all Muslims to keep it. Ahadith on the subject are only saying that if we are to keep moustaches and beard, they should be kept propely like a noble man would do. One should not have moustaches overgrown and beards trimmed short. To me, therefore, whoever is following this principle while keeping moustaches and beard is following the messenger. The one who is not keeping a beard has not even been mentioned in the ahadith. And Allah
knows best.

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