How did the Prophet wipe his head in wudu?
The Third Obligation of Wudu: Wiping the Head and Ears
Summary
This lecture covers the third obligation of wudu (ablution): wiping the head. Sh. Ali Mashhour explains that wiping must be done over the entirety of the head, starting from where face washing ends and moving backward. The ears are considered part of the head and must be wiped without taking additional water. Sh. Ali Mashhour details the Prophet's methodology, citing various hadith narrations about how he performed this act. The lecture also discusses scholarly differences regarding the minimum requirement for head wiping, clarifying that while scholars debate the bare minimum (ranging from any part of the head to one-fourth), they all agree the Prophet wiped his entire head when it was uncovered.
Note: This transcript was generated using YouTube's automatic captioning, with AI-assisted cleanup for readability. It may contain inaccuracies due to background noise, audio quality, or limitations of the transcription software — particularly during Arabic recitation. Listener discretion is advised; please refer to the original video for precise wording.
Continuing in in the chapter regarding the obligations of wuboo. So yesterday we spoke about washing the hands from the tips of the fingers all the way up the forearms to include the elbows. We discussed that in some detail. And now the author goes into the third obligation of he says He says the third is wiping the head entirely, the whole head and the ears are part of the head. So let's unpack this statement here. Wiping over the entirety of the head. The wiping over the head is to take place from where the washing of the face ended. The place where washing the face stopped. This is where the wiping over the head begins. And the prophet sallallah.aii alaihi wasallam would most usually wipe his head one time going back. Right? So he'd start at the front and he would work his way back. Now before doing this he would wet his hands. If a person were to say, you know, I'll just wash my head instead, right? If wiping is good, then washing is better. It doesn't work that way. It would be saying if is good, then five is better. It doesn't work that way. It must be wiping. And wiping in the Arabic language is that there is water on the hands and the hands are run over the entirety of the of the head, right? Over the entirety of the head. And so most of the time he had long hair except for Omra. And so he would wipe put put the water on his hands, right? And then he would start this with both of his hands and he would wipe from the front to the back. That's it. That is how he would wipe his head. On occasion, he would go back and then forward. So he would wipe back and then come forward again. And this is actually kind of a hangup for the wording in a lot of these narrations because some companions said he then describing his woo he then would wipe his head by bringing them forward and then back. So he gives you the imagery of what of starting back here going forward and then back. But that's not what the narrator intends. The narrator intends that from his perspective he's standing behind him watching the prophet sallall.aii wasallam make to the prophet sallall.aii wasallam. He's going back and then forward to the onlooker. He's coming forward with his hands and then back. But he was not narrated to have authentically and clearly started from the back of his head. He always starts from the front. He would either wipe it once or sometimes he would wipe once and then back. There is a third narration in surah dud which articulates that he wiped his head three times three the narration of armed however the authenticity of this narration is contested if it is authentic it is a very rare thing that he would wipe three times over his head and then he would do the ears without taking water again without wetting his hands again. So from wiping his head, he would put his index fingers into his ears and his thumbs behind the ears and he would wipe all that part of the ear that is that is protruding, you know. So he would wipe the entirety of the ear. So he would wipe the fronts of the ears with his f index fingers and the backs of his ears with his thumbsatam. And the ears is like the mouth and nose to the face. The ears to the head are the mouth and nose are to the face. in the sense that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says wash your face and every single time he made woo he washed or rinsed his mouth and nose. So that means that he understood that the mouth and nose are part of what part of the face and what else would they be really right? What else would they be? Likewise, the ears, the ears are part of the head. And so every single time he made wudoo, he would never fail to wipe his ears. am. And furthermore, in a narration which has many chains of narration and it was reported by and many others on the authority of the prophet sallall.aii said he said the ears are part of the head. So it's very clear. Now this is the idyllic way to wipe over the head and this is how he would always wipe over his head. The difference of opinion amongst the scholarship of Islam and the mad all of them agree that the head is to be wiped. All of them agree that the best wiping of the head is all of the head entirely. And as we mentioned before, 90% of the differences of opinion amongst the mahib is not what's right or wrong. It's what is right and what's better. And it's not what's wrong, but what's wrong and what's worse. Details. The difference of opinion is not in this that I just described to you. That is across the board. The difference of opinion is the bare minimum. What is the bare minimum? So for instance, he said the bare minimum is any part of the head even if just on his temple that. That's enough cuz technically he wiped his head, right? And it all comes down to what we understand the sentence to mean in the Arabic language.
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And in the it is a fourth a fourth of the head. If you do a fourth of the head, 3/4s is better. But 1/4 is the bare minimum. Said just any part of the head. And this again goes down to what we understand the to mean in Allah's words. So some of the scholars they say here means meaning and wipe over a part of your heads. That's what it would translate to. Whilst others say.
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Means wipe over your heads with water on your hands. That's an that's another meaning here for the be and we see this meaning used elsewhere in the Quran. So for instance in.
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And so based on how they understood this bell is what they understood the bare minimum to be. None of them contested how the prophet sallall.aii wasallam wiped over his head. How is that? He would wipe over all of his head if it was exposed. The only instance we find that he did not wipe over the entirety of his head is when he was wearing something on his head. That is the only time. There is no narration that is authentic and clear. That in all the years he made wool, he wiped over a portion of his head when his head was uncovered. Never. only when when he would have something on his head and not just something on his head like a hat I have a hat on my head now. When it is something that is complex and requires to be wrapped and made up. And this is why some scholars say a person cannot wipe over his turban unless his turban is mucca. Meaning that the turban is wrapped in such a way that there is complexity and it wraps under the under the chin. So that if he had to make woo, he'd have to take all this thing off to wipe over his head and then put it all back on again and wrap it all up again. And this is a a kind of hindrance, right? And so only on that occasion when he had this kind of turban on, he would wipe whatever is showing of his head and then finish the wiping over the turban. But never once was he narrated to have his head uncovered making mood and then only wipe over a portion of his head. And this again goes down to what bare minimum technically. What is the bare minimum? Remember we spoke about this a few days ago when we spoke about the mouth and nose that if something is not obligatory, he will at least one time not do it in order to what? Articulate that it is better and not absolutely mandatory. But here we don't have that. So we understand from this that he understood that anytime your head is bare, you are wiping over all of the head. And if someone has something on their head, a woman has her hijab on the prophet sallallah.aii's alaihi wasallam's wives and others they would as well wipe over their hijab just he would wipe over his turban. However, if the head is exposed, the wiping is for the entirety of the head and the ears are what? Part of the head. Foreham.
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