How Did the Prophet Actually Pray

Foreign you for joining us welcome brothers and sisters esteemed guests as we continue on through our journey through the book provisions for the hereafter authored by the late and esteemed scholar of islam now in this installment we would to discuss how the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam would recite what the general pattern for his recitation and prayer was now we discussed before what he would recite we discussed before how the recitation itself would be right and elongating certain vowels etc now we're going to discuss how he would disperse that recitation throughout his prayer following that we will discuss the bowing position rising from and we will also speak about some of the things that he would say in court aside from what is generally known insha'allah.

[Silence]

One of the things we're going to understand here is that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam would not ever stick to one specific particular chapter of the quran or section of the quran for every salah meaning he would traditionally only recite these chapters during this salah except for salah and these two prayers he would recite what we have mentioned before and he would stick to that every other prayer he would generally recite certain things or or chapters of certain lengths but not necessarily always right he says he says and one of his ways his traditions is that generally he would always recite the the entire chapter to its comp with its to its completion so if he would start a chapter he would end it he would finish the whole chapter and sometimes he would disperse that chapter between two units of prayer between two rakah so let's say for example right so he's reciting you've got three rakah the first he will recite let's say half of surat al-araf and then the second he will recite the other half of surat al-araf so usually if he starts a chapter he will finish it in one draka if not he may distribute it over two away and as for reciting just the ends of chapters right the end of a chapter of the quran often times people recite the ends of the chapters meaning the last 10 or 15 verses of the chapters especially the very long chapters of the quran usually allah subhanahu wa ta'ala sums up the general principles and the generalities of what has passed in the chapter so you'll find a lot of chapters of the quran where they end it they end with a lot of principles and morals to derive from the stories that passed in that chapter etc so a lot of people to recite those endings as well people to choose pick and choose different places throughout the quran now this is permissible but it's not necessarily the sunnah right and we discussed many times before the difference between permissible and the sunnah and that means that everything that is the sunnah is permissible but not everything that is permissible is necessarily the sunnah he says and as for reciting two chapters in a single recap this is something that he used to do customarily in the optional prayers prayers at night right and as for reciting with redundancy the same chapter in the first same chapter in the second this is something that would rarely ever happen we mentioned an example of that with surah in salah before we proceed there are a couple of questions that come up what about if a person recited only surat al-fatiha we would say this is valid the person has left off something that is very virtuous and could be argued is the essence of the prayer but it is a valid prayer technically because the only thing that is a pillar of salah what about if a person recited surat al-fatiha more than once so let's say you recite surat al-fatiha and then you recite it again in the same raqqah is that permissible yes that falls into the generality of recite what is easy for you of the quran a person could do that it's never been narrated that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam ever did that but all of the quran is permissible to recite during the standing position of salah another question is is bismillah a verse of surat al-fatiha meaning when i'm reciting when i am reciting do i have to recite along with it bismillah the correct answer is that bismillah is an independent verse which marks the beginning of chapters it is an independent verse which marks the beginning of chapters it is not a verse of surat al-fatiha in the correct opinion though many of the scholars of islam do conti do consider it to be as such and so it is better and more correct that a person recite bismillah even if only to him or herself these are some of the issues that arise with regards to recitation in prayer he says he says and the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam used to extend the first over the second and we mentioned this as a general rule salah should be something that starts out long and progresses to shorter right so the first raka is the longest and the last of any given prayer is should be the shortest right and rukur and the bowing and prostration positions they should as well complement the standing position so a person is not going to stand for a very long time and then maybe make very brief little cooler and then make extremely long so you this is not correct this throws off the balance of the prayer the prayer should start long-winded and it should progress to shorter from longer to shorter right and so the first raka would be longer than the second and the second longer than the third and the third longer than the fourth etc etc right and sometimes the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam would make the first soraka so long that no one is coming and arriving to salah anymore meaning that you know as you start prayer people are kind of trickling in right but if that prayer lasts long enough meaning that first soraka lasts long enough everybody who is going to come for prayer will have already come and this is something that would happen in the time of the prophet salallahu that the first raqqa would be so long that everyone who is coming to prayer has already come nobody will have missed the first s he says and when the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam would conclude his recitation for any given he would raise his hands.

[Arabic recitation]

And making now let's look at the exact wording that is here he says he says when he would finish his prayer he would raise his hands and make techbeer while going into the court while transitioning from standing into the bowing position what does that mean this tekbeer the techbear of you know.

[Arabic recitation]

Transitioning between standing and rukur between standing and sujood between the sajdah between sujud and standing etc every time we move.

[Arabic recitation]

Is referred to by the scholars of islam as takbirot al-intercal this is referred to by the focahe as techbiora tul intercal that is the the tech beer of transition the tech beer of transition and it's an important name why is that important because the name defines it and it defines its proper place this is a mistake that is made a lot by people who pray and that is that when i conclude my recitation and i wish to move into the court the beginning of my tequila should start with the beginning of my motion and transition into bowing and it should end when i reach to the position of bowing it shouldn't be before i start to bow and it shouldn't be after i finish bowing right.

[Arabic recitation]

Right as i move as i move the takbir is being made and it should start with the start of my movement and should end when i reach that position it is takbiro tul intercal it is the takbir which takes place in transition from one position to the next this is its definition this is its name give it this name to identify its proper placement.

[Arabic recitation]

And then they start to make rokura this is incorrect and this has placed the takbir in the standing position where it does not belong likewise and this happens a lot with people who lead salah right they will say and they will move when they reach allah so they'll this happens a lot in sujud with people who lead saleh this happens in the first sujud and this happens in standing after sujud so they don't want anybody to reach the ground and subdued before them as the imam so what do they do they don't make takabhi until they reach the sujood position.

[Arabic recitation]

This is an invalid takbir you have placed it in sujud its placement is in transition likewise people don't want anybody to get up before them so they will get up completely reach the standing position and then they will say.

[Arabic recitation]

You have placed this tech beer in the standing position before recitation and that is an improper placement of it that invalidates it because it is to be made in transition not in position now there's a difference between making a portion of it in transition and making the entire thing after transition what does that mean well so for example a person is standing from sujud or going into the court let's say they begin and they start and as they are in their as they are in transition from standing to the core they begin the tech beer but they complete the tech beer while they are in the position of or while they are in the position of sujud or while they are in the standing position this is permissible this is fine as the scholars of islam mention however to completely take it out of transition and put it into one position or the other this invalidates this tech being and so the motion from the these things should happen simultaneously raising the hands making tech beer and going to suju these things should have these things should happen simultaneously in the transition right he says now he gives us the exact position that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam would be making he says when he would arrive at rukur he would place his two hands on his knees he would spread his fingers and he would almost grasp at his knees almost as if he is holding his knees in his hand of course the the the legs are straight right the legs are straight so a person can't necessarily grasp their legs but they are grabbing at their knees as if their knees are in their hands right and he would bend his elbows while he is in the core his elbows would be bent they would not be straight sometimes people to make roku this this is not how the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam would make he would make with the arms slightly bent this right he says not only would he bend his arms his elbows he would break his elbows but as well he would fan them out away from his sides he would not make it this he would fan his elbows out away from his sides he would extend his back he would stretch his back out and make his back as flat as possible so his record his back would not be bent his back would be as flat as possible and he is would also hold his head in a natural position which would be which would be relative to the straightness of his back so his back would be in line with his head his head would neither be lifted way up nor would it be dangling down his head would just be straight with his back so his spine would be straight.

[Silence]

He says and when he would be in rukur the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam would say subhana rabbi this is what he would say and sometimes he would say along with that subhana bina so what would he say subhan subhan will be this was something that was added near the end of his life different variations of this and in sujud that this was something that the prophet salallahu alaihi wasallam adopted and started to say after the revelation foreign so this chapter of the quran was revealed regarding the conquest of mecca right the conquest of mecca which took place in the seventh or eighth year after hijrah difference of opinion amongst the historians of islam the point is is that this is something that he adopted later on prior to this he was known in the narration of even mr ud and others he was known to have said in his a person can say this as many times as he would like there is a narration in jamaica that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam would say this ten times the narration has weakness in it what is most customary amongst the scholars of phil to mention is three times however one time will suffice however that one time is not in this way that mangles the words and compresses them this is not valid according to all of the scholars of islam rather it is right and what is best is at least three times and some scholars of islam mention that this is the bare minimum right this is how the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam this is the particular remembrance or statement he would customarily make in rukur there are other things that we'll mention later inshallah as for the addition of subhan arabiya this is a weak narration literally translates to i proclaim the profession of my lord i proclaim that allah is disassociated from any imperfection that is my greatest and great lord roughly this is what it means and his you the usual length of his bowing would be about the length of ten tesbihat so subhan arab be allahim ten times as we just mentioned right and this is this is actually something that we should address and that is a problem that people have when they do something a lot the body tends to want to take shortcuts right so we want to summarize so a person begins praying when they first learn how to pray and doing everything perfectly and then after that years go by and it turns into whatever it is that people say you hear are people saying all kinds of things and this now turns into something which is totally incoherent and is not valid it has to be said just that this happens a lot with all kinds of things such as alhamdulillah a lot of times people will say it the alhamdulillah this is not correct this completely changes the meaning but second of all it's very it's a very it's a very passive way of saying something that is very great in the eyes of allah subhanahu wa ta'ala likewise upon the prophet sallallahu alaihi you hear lecturers a lot or people that give khutbah or what have you orators as they call them speaking and often times when they go to say the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam which is a dua right we would hear sallallahu sallam or whatever it is people say right and this also happens in in writing in writing the books the scholars of hadith have books written on the etiquettes of hadith writing hadith reading hadith memorizing hadith speaking hadith etc all of these things and one of the things that they mention is what is known with the scholars of hadith as salaam salaam is an abbreviation right of sallallahu alaihi wasallam so they write saud to represent sallah and then lam to represent allah an ayan to represent alaihi and meme to represent was sallam right and so they will abbreviate it right this is not permissible in islam it is not permissible and this is something that specifically the scholars of hadith and the scholars of islam have have looked down upon and prohibited in their writings that a person abbreviate that we have the same thing in english people will say instead of sallallahu people write s a w you know w or s a a w or all of these different abbreviations and this is something first of all it is foreign to arabic language right in the arabic language there are no shortcuts that look this there's there are no abbreviations this that's number one not in this form number two this is something which is articulates a lack of respect for the worship of making a salah upon the prophet sallallahu alaihi so every time a person says upon that individual 10 times and as an anecdote it's mentioned that the first man to have written salaam his hand actually became crippled after he had written this this is something that the scholars of hadith mention and so the point is is that it is not befitting it is not becoming of a muslim to mangle the words of worship right to mangle the words of you know and this happens a lot with tasbih after salah right we see people making tasbih after in a superhuman speed it is impossible to say subhanallah that fast spa right fingers moving so fast you can't even count that fast this is just a waste of time that's that's all that is there there is no reward in this right to just spasm it should be subhan allah subhan allah subhan allah subhan allah subhanallah and we will speak about that when we get to it inshaallah after we conclude the description of prayer the point here is that this is worship right we are not looking for quantity always in worship we are looking for quality right if you say subhana rabbi al-alim one time properly with presence of mine that is better than ten times improperly without presence of mine he says that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam's bowing position would be ten roughly the length of ten test behad.

[Silence]

And sometimes occasionally he is make his bowing position and his sujud position the same length as his standing position the recitation of yet this is something that the prophet alaihi wasallam would only occasionally do in the night prayer when he's praying by himself right as well we want to discuss the length of urukur and sujud we'd also to discuss what is not permissible to say in quran sujud and that is it is not permissible in rukur and sujud to recite the quran so if a person is in a state of they're in a state of sujud it is impermissible for a person to recite the quran as the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam has prohibited yet if there is some dua in the quran that are found in the quran if a person were to make this dua in a state of rukur or sujud with not with the intention of reciting the quran then this is permissible inshallah he says fahed you he says the traditionally the way the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam would customarily pray it would be in a way that the rest all of his salah is very similar right in that light progression from longest to shortest and standing positions all kind of complement each other in their length and sometimes he would say in his dua so meaning this literally which translates to my lord allah he is one who is absolutely infallible he is absolutely holy he is the lord of the angels and the spirit meaning jibril or the spirit of faith and in you i have believed and to you i have submitted myself my hearing and my vision have both become very still in your presence and likewise my tendons and my innards and my bones have all become very still in your presence out of exaltation and something that usually he would only make in the night prayer allah.

[Silence]

He says he would then raise from saying in the process again this is a this is.

[Arabic recitation]

To take place in the transition right transition from to standing the person should be saying they should not say it before they go and they should not say it after they're already standing wrong it should be semi-allah exactly in that way and he would raise his hands with this right this is something that i see a lot of times people make a mistake in it is a misinterpretation of the sunnah and i know that this is kind of going to be a bit i don't know i wouldn't say controversial but i would say this is going to be a bit a statement that is often misunderstood and that is that not every piece of knowledge is appropriate for every individual right which is one of the reasons why the extreme influx of translation of classical arabic works and even the printing press in arabic has not done the most good for the muslim ummah there was a time when the scholars of islam were privy to things that they could understand where the rest of the people may very well misunderstand and this is a principle of disseminating knowledge right there is a narration in sahih al-bukhari in the book of knowledge in which the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam was writing with muay the bin jebel right while they've been jebel was writing behind him we spoke about muay thai that he is one of the scholars of islam one of the greatest scholars of islam with regards to jurispudence and that's the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam asked in this narration do you know what the rights of allah over the slaves are and what the slaves what the rights of the slaves upon allah are and why i have responded allah and his messenger know best meaning teach me inform me tell me he said he said the right of allah over the servants is that they worship him alone and not associate anyone unto he in their worship of him he said allah and the rights that allah has placed upon himself and for on behalf of the servants meaning the rights of the servants upon allah are that he not torture or punish those who do not associate any partners until he then said ya rasulullah shall he said then said oh messenger of allah should i not give this great news to the people should i not announce it to everyone he said do not announce it to the general masses because they will become complacent they will become complacent what does that mean that one of the aspects of the meanings of this narration is that not all knowledge is appropriate for all people right the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam selectively told this to muat because muad would understand this and he would excel this would make him more excellent whereas this kind of knowledge may very well be misinterpreted by others who are less knowledgeable hence affecting in a negative fashion their worship of allah subhanahu wa this is something that comes with years of experience of teaching people that a person does not tell people things that will be easily misunderstood and cause them to become complacent or lazy cause them to become undis undisciplined right and so example for example when it comes to the books of hadith the books of narration let's say the the six books of hadith is these books have not only been printed and distributed to everyone but they have also been translated and distributed and this very well may act to compound problems because now everybody thinks that he understands and it takes years of experience to understand these books these books are for people who understand how to put things in their proper place and so people will start to just swim in all these narrations and derive rulings for themselves and the biggest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance it is the illusion of knowledge this is the greatest enemy to knowledge the greatest enemy to knowledge is not that you don't know the greatest enemy to knowledge is to think that you know when you don't right and so this opening the floodgates of all information to everyone which we have in our time not just in islamic literature and knowledge but in all facets of knowledge this has flooded our minds with information that we have not been taught and have not been given time to properly process and so we are people who are full of facts and we have very little knowledge right and we discussed this before and so back to misinterpreting the sunnah i've seen a lot of people make mistakes in all of these parts that we have spoken about because they have misinterpreted especially in english or in another language other than arabic misinterpreted the books of hadith right now here is the issue when you have arabic and you are reading the arabic there is one element of mistake that takes place there roughly i mean there could be misprints and so forth but the main the main part that may cause the the the weakest link there is your understanding of the arabic language and you're understanding more specifically of the language and terminology of the prophet sallallahu alaihi but when you translate that into another language now this has been compounded right now you're relying on your understanding which relies upon the understanding of a translator and there are a lot of mistranslations unfortunately especially of late translation has become a fad it's become a money thing and so everyone who speaks a little bit of arabic dabbles a little bit now starts to translate all kinds of things all kinds of incorrect ways right there is no such thing as translating the exact words you're not translating the exact words you're translating the meanings that you have understood from those words the translation is a very very precise science people go to school for it and it takes a lot of understanding for a person to properly and adequately translate right the scholars of islam mention four conditions for translation and most of the time three or sometimes even all four are not met what was that and so back to the point here which we will end with and that is that the mistake that is often made is that when we read the narration of ibn abbas that the prophet salallahu well people understand that to be sad this says misplaced where this is intended this is not what ibn abbas was referring to this is now before sujud now i'm raising my hands before sujud i'm not raising my hands after what his meant is he would raise samia.

[Arabic recitation]

Right this is the time when a person is to raise his hands from raising from rukur to the standing position that's the raising of the hands and the motion and transition from bowing to standing should all be simultaneous at the same time we will end with that today inshaallah tonight.

[Arabic recitation]