THE NAMĀZ OF TARĀWĪH It is written in the book Nūr-ul-izāh[1] and in its explanation: It is sunnat-i
muakkada for men and women to perform the tarāwīh, which consists of twenty
rakats. A person who disbelieves this is a heretic and his testimony is not to
be accepted. Rasūlullah (sallallāhu alaihi wa sallam) performed eight rakats
of the tarāwīh in jamāat for several nights. [Thereafter he would go home and
complete the set of twenty rakats]. It has also been reported by savants that
when alone he performed twenty rakats of tarāwīh. [It consists of twenty
rakats in all the four Madhhabs]. Hence, it has been understood that it is a
sunnat. The three Khalīfas and all the Sahāba of that time performed twenty
rakats of the tarāwīh in jamāat. And a hadīth commands us to adapt ourselves
to those Khalīfas and to the ijmā (unanimity) of the Sahāba.
The tarāwīh is performed after the last sunnat of night prayer and
before the witr. [A person cannot perform the tarāwīh before performing the
night prayer. (Ibni Ābidīn, p. 295) Yet
it can be performed after the witr. It can be performed any time until morning
prayer. It cannot be performed after the dawn has broken. It cannot be
performed as a qadā prayer, either. (That is, it cannot be performed later at
some other time.) For the tarāwīh is a strong sunnat, but not as strong as the
final sunnats of the evening and night prayers. And those sunnats, despite
their value, are not performed as qadā. Qadā is necessary only for those prayers
of namāz that are fard and for the witr. [The tarāwih is performed as a qadā
prayer in the Shāfiī Madhhab.] It is sunnat-i kifāya to perform the tarāwīh in
jamāat. That is, when it is performed in jamāat in a mosque, others may
perform it alone in their homes, which is not sinful. But in this case they
will be deprived of the blessings of jamāat in the mosque.] If they perform it
in jamāat with one or more people in their homes, they will earn twenty-seven
times the blessings they would attain if they performed it alone. To perform
tarāwīh, they stand up for the following rakat after making the salām at the
end of
---------------------------------
[1] This book, and also its commentary entitled Imdād-ul-Fettāh,
or Merāq-il-felāh, were written by the scholar of Fiqh in the Hanafī
Madhhab Abul-Ikhlās Hasan bin Ammar Shernblālī 'rahmatullāhi ta'ālā 'alaih',
(994-1069 [1658 A.D.],
every two rakats. Or they can give the
salām at the end of every four rakats. They sit for a period equaling the time
it takes to perform four rakats between every four rakats and they should
recite the salawāt or the tasbīhāt or the Qurān-i
kerīm. Or they can sit silently. It is better to make the salām after
every two rakats and to make the niyyat (intention) before each takbīr of
iftitāh (beginning). Those who did not perform the night prayer in jamāat
cannot perform the tarāwīh in jamāat. For the jamāat performing the tarāwīh
have to be the same jamāat performing the fard. A person who did not perform
the night prayer in jamāat can perform the fard alone and then join the
jamāat who are performing the tarāwīh. [See the twenty-third chapter].
Subhāna zi-l-mulki
wa-l-melekūt. Subhāna zi-I-'izzeti wa-l-'azameti
wa-l-jelāli wa-l-jemāli wa-l-jeberūt. Subhāna-l-meliki-l-mevjūd.
Subhāna-l-meliki-l-ma'būd. Subhāna-l-meliki-l-hayyillezī lā yenāmu wa lā yemūt. Subbūhun quddūsun Rabbunā wa Rabb-ul-melāiketi
wa-r-rūh. Merhaben, merhaben, merhabā yā shehr-a-Ramadān. Merhaben, merhaben, merhabā yā
shehr-al-bereket-i-wa-l-ghufrān. Merhaben, merhaben,
merhabā yā shehr-et-tesbīhi wa-t-tehlīli wa-dh-dhikri wa tilāwa-t-il-Qur'ān.
Awwaluhū ākhiruhū, zāhiruhū, bātinuhū yā men
lā ilāha iliā huw.
The prayer to be said at the end of the namāz of tarāwih
Allāhumma salli 'alā sayyidinā Muhammadin wa 'alā Āl-i-sayyidinā Muhammad. Bi'aded-i-kull-i-dāin wa
dewāin wa bārik wa sellim 'alaihi wa 'alaihim
kethīrā. This prayer is recited three times. At the third time the following prayer
is added: "wa salli wa sellim wa bārik 'alaihi wa 'alaihim kethīran
kethīrā." Yā Hannān, ya Mennān, yā Deyyān, yā Burhān. Yā Zel-fadli
wa-l-ihsān nerjul-afwa wa-l-ghufrān. Wa-j-'alnā min
utekā shehr-i-Ramadān bi hurmet-il-Qur'ān.
Places where people come together in order to worship are called temples or places
of worship.
Jewish temples are called Synagogues or Hawras. Christian temples are called Churches or Bīas
or Sawmeas. Muslim temples are called Masjīds or Jāmīs.
In temples methods of worship and religious commandments and
prohibitions are taught. People who are
responsible for making speeches in todays temples dwell upon two things:
1 - Through bright, obtrusive words; tragic stories, melodious,
touching recitals, and even with musical instruments and loud-speakers, todays
preachers try to move the audience to a level of enthusiasm and compassion, in
order to conquer their hearts so that the people will give themselves up and be
driven towards a certain purpose.
2 - To teach the commandments and the prohibitions of the religion, and
to get the people to obey them.
Today in Christian churches and Jewish synagogues only the first aim is
being accomplished, which results in the unity of egos and thoughts, rather
than in the unity of hearts and souls. And in the name of religious
obligations, tenets that were put forward by ancient men of religion are being
taught, but these things differ, depending on time and place. For this reason,
churches and synagogues are no longer temples but places for politics and
conferences, where people are benumbed and dragged behind the desires and
thoughts of leaders and chiefs.
In mosques also men of religion have been seen in every time period who
speak for political and financial purposes. They are religiously ignorant
people (yobaz) who have not read the
books written by Islamic scholars, but have been deceived by false books
written by lā-Madhhabī and heretical people. They are poor people who, let
alone teaching religious requirements and having them practised, have not even
learned them for themselves. Being ignorant and aberrant religious officials,
who do not even know how to make an ablution or ghusl properly or how to
perform namāz suitably with its conditions, they have misled Muslims and harmed
Islam and people in every century. They are orators and lecturers, who, wearing
long loose gowns and big turbans, impress the audience under a rootless and
transient influence by reciting melodiously, pronouncing falsely adorned words,
and telling exciting stories on minbars and preaching pulpits. Like speakers
for political parties, dictators, fascist administrators and churches, they
have deceived pious people by dosing them with volatile enthusiasm. Our
scholars have referred to them not as men of religion but as thieves of faith
and īmān, yobazes. Those true men of
religion, who always preached from the books of Islamic scholars and whose
words, manners and deeds
were in conformity with those books,
protected Islam against them.
Abussuūd Efendi rahmatullāhi taālā alaih says in his fatwā: If
there is not a mosque in a village or district and if the inhabitants do not
perform namāz in jamāat, the government has to force them to make a mosque.
Those who neglect the jamāat must be punished. In the year 940 (Hijrī) in 1533
an edict (firman) commanding this was sent to every province by the Khalīfa.
It is written in Majmūat-i Jadīda[1]: If an old mosque cannot contain the
entire jamaat, it is permissible for the people living in that quarter to demolish
it and to build a larger one with their own money.
It is written on the six hundred and thirteenth page of Halabī-i kebīr: Performing namāz in a local
masjīd is better than performing it in larger mosques, even if the people
making the jamāat are fewer than that in larger ones. It is better for someone
who is late for the jamāat in his local majsīd to go to another mosque in
order to perform the times prayer with the jamāat therein. If there is not an
opportunity for him to join another jamāat in another mosque, it will be
better for him to prefer his own local masjīd and perform the prayer alone. If
there is not an imām or a muazzin, one of the Muslims in the jamāat must
assume this task. They should not go to another mosque. If the imām of your
local masjīd performs the night prayer during the time when the redness in the
sky where the sun has set has disappeared, instead of waiting for the whiteness
also to disappear, it will be better for you not to perform namāz with that
imām in jamāat, but to perform it alone when the whiteness has disappeared as
well. [Nowadays, the azāns for the night prayers are called rather early in big
cities. Thus, the ijtihād of Imām-i azam is not follolwed. Yet, because they
are called in compliance with the qawl of the Imāmayn, it is better to join
these jamāats.] If the imām of your local masjid is notorious for fisq, that
is, if he is known to commit any one of the grave sins, [for instance, if he
does not perform the azān in conformity with the Sharīat], it will be better
for you to go to another mosque to perform the prayer in jamāat. For,
abstaining from something that is mekrūh is given priority when compared with
doing
---------------------------------
[1] Written by Hasan Khayrullah Efendi 'rahmatullāhi ta'ālā 'alaih', (.1 1316). Please review the final part of fourth chapter.
Ibni Ābidīn states:
1 - It is mekrūh to lock the doors of a mosque. It is not mekrūh if
there is a danger of thieves.
2 - Sexual intercourse on a mosque is tahrīmī mekrūh. Also it is mekrūh
to step on the Kaba or on a mosque. It is harām for a person who is junub to
mount the mosque.
3 - It is tahrīmī mekrūh to relieve nature on a mosque. [It is written
in Terghīb-us-salāt that it is mekrūh to
build a toilet under a mosque or in front of the Mihrāb wall]. For the area
over the mosque is a mosque all the way up to heaven. So is the area below the
mosque. However, it is permissible to make a shadirvan or a bath under a
mosque.
4 - It is permissible to walk through a mosque sometimes. But it is
mekrūh to make it your regular route. It is not mekrūh if there is a good
reason to do so. In your first passing each day you should perform the namāz of
Tahiyyatulmasjīd. You do not have to
perform it during your subsequent passings. Hamawī in his explanation of Ashbāh, says, It is a unanimously-reported
sunnat that anybody entering a mosque should perform two rakats of Tahiyyat-ul-masjīd. Sometimes the word mustahab
means sunnat. If someone is reciting the Qurān-i kerīm
then the tahiyyat will not be performed because listening to the Qurān-i kerīm is fard. It is awlā (better) to omit a sunnat even for a fard-i
kifāya. Reading the Qurān al-kerīm
melodiously and, in turn, listening to it is harām. [Hence, it is necessary to
perform the sunnats of the four daily prayers of namāz with the intention of
qadā]. It is stated in Qādīhān, If the
imām recites melodiously, it is recommendable to go to another mosque. If he is
a fornicator or a usurer, [or if it is known that he commits another harām or
lets his wife or daughters go out without covering themselves as prescribed by
Islam], it becomes a must to go to another mosque. A person who makes it a
habit to walk through a mosque without a good excuse becomes sinful. How one
should step in and out of a mosque is written at the beginning of chapter 20.
5 - It is mekrūh to bring najasāt into a mosque. A person who has najāsat
on his person cannot enter a mosque. It is permissible to burn a lamp with najs
oil. It is written in Fatāwā-i fiqhiyya:
A person who sees najāsat in a mosque has to clean it right away.
It is sinful to delay the cleaning without
an excuse. A person who sees najāsat on another person who is performing namāz
or on the place where he is making the sajda should let him know. Letting him
know it or waking up a person who is about to miss namāz (because he is
sleeping) is not wājib, but it is sunnat.
6 - It is mekrūh to plaster a mosque with mortar or mud made with najs
water. It is not mekrūh to plaster it with mud mixed with the dung of a cow.
This is because there is darūrat (necessity) in doing that (Hindiyya). Please see chapter 6.
7 - It is mekrūh to relieve ones nature in a container in a mosque.
The same applies for cupping. It is not mekrūh to break wind inadvertently.
8 - It is harām to let mad people or small children who will bring
najāsat into a mosque enter the mosque. It is mekrūh if there is no danger of
najāsat.
9 - It is tahrīmī mekrūh to set up markets, to talk loudly, to make
speeches, to quarrel, to take up arms, and to punish others in a mosque. [It is
harām to say the khutbas of Friday and Iyd prayers as though one is making a speech].
10 - It is mekrūh to enter a mosque with nals, i.e. shoes worn
outdoors. It is much better for men to perform namāz with clean mests or nals
than to perform it with their bare feet. [Nals or nalayn are shoes with
leather soles and straps. It is mekrūh to walk around wearing nalayn with
wooden soles.] By abstaining from such behavior you will have opposed to Jews.
Please see the sixty-eighth chapter of the first part of the Turkish version.
It is not mekrūh to relieve ones nature or to have sexual intercourse
in a house where one room has been made a masjīd or in a room containing a copy
of the Qurān. So is the case with those places where the namāz of Iyd or
janāza is performed, but the jamāat in a mosque can follow the imām (who is
conducting the namāz) in one of those places. A menstruating woman or a person
who is junub can enter such places as well as yards of mosques, madrasas and
tekkes.
11 - It is permissible to decorate the walls of a mosque, except the
wall of the qibla. But it is better to spend the money for the poor. It is
mekrūh to decorate the wall of the qibla with valuable things or with colours.
Also, it is mekrūh if the side walls are decorated excessively.
The book Durr-ul-mukhtār says at
the end of the section
dealing with the mekrūhs of namāz: The
best of mosques is the Kaba-i muazzama, next comes Masjīd-i harām, and next comes Masjīd-i
Nebī, which is in Medīna-i munawwara. Then comes Masjīd-i aqsā in Jerusalem, which is followed by
the masjīd of Kubā, which is near the
blessed city of Medīna-i munawwara. Masjīd-i Nebī used to be a hundred dhrā
long and a hundred dhrā wide. One dhrā is half a metre. Later it was widened
in the course of time. Its present size is good, too.
[The most valuable soil is the soil which is touching the Prophets (salallāhu alaihi wa sallam) blessed body in
the Qabr-i Saādat (the Prophets grave); it is
more valuable than the Arsh and than Paradise. Times, places, all things closer
to him, and his children are more valuable and better than those that are far
from him. Mosques and Prophets are exempt from
this.]
12 - It is harām to importune (for money) in a mosque.
13 - It is mekrūh to give alms to a beggar who annoys people in a
mosque.
14 - It is mekrūh to look for lost things in a mosque.
15 - It is tahrīmī mekrūh to read a poem containing a lampoon against a
Believer, a love affair or indecency. It produces thawāb to read those poems
containing preaches, advice, hikmat, blessings of Allahu taālā, words praising
Believers [i.e. ilāhīs, mawlids] without melodies, and it is permissible to
read historical poems occasionally; yet, it is not something esteemable to busy
oneself with poetry.
It is permissible to say ilāhīs and mawlīds in mosques sometimes
[provided you will not prevent others from performing namāz]. It is not
permissible to say them always or to make it a habit.
16 - It is fard-i kifāya for people without an excuse to listen to the Qurān al-kerīm. It is sinful to begin reading the
Qurān al-kerīm loudly in a place where
people are working, sleeping, performing namāz or if there is someone
preaching. Likewise, a person who turns on a radio or a tape recorder, or a
hafiz who allows his own voice to be recorded is deemed to have committed a sin
for not having properly respected the Qurān
al-kerīm.
17 - It is mekrūh to splash the water used for making an ablution in a
mosque, to dirty a mosque with phlegm or mucus.
However, it is permissible to make an
ablution at a place specially prepared in a mosque.
It is not permissible to make an ablution or a ghusl around the well of
Zamzām. For it is within a mosque. It also is not permissible for a person who
is junub to enter there.
18 - It is mekrūh to plant unnecessary trees in a mosque. It is
permissible if they give public benefits, such as absorbing the moisture in a
mosque or making shades. It is mekrūh to plant them for ones personal use.
19 - It is mekrūh to eat something or to sleep in a mosque. A musāfir
is exempted from this. When entering a mosque, a musāfir must intend for Itikāf and perform the namāz of tahiyyatulmasjīd
first. Thereafter he can eat and talk about worldly matters. A person who makes
itikāf can eat and sleep. Itikāf is sunnat-i muakkada. It is written in Berīqa that neglecting the itikāf without a good
excuse is like omitting the sunnats of five daily prayers.
A person who eats strong smelling things, such as onions and garlics
[or who smokes], in the mosque, must be prohibited. Butchers, fisherman,
sellers of livers, oil sellers, if their clothes are dirty or if they smell
badly those with bad smelling clothes and those who hurt the jamāat by
talking must be turned out of the mosque. A person who has eaten something
smelling like medicine should not go to a mosque because he has an excuse. A bad
smell tortures men and angels.
20 - Making a contract for buying and selling in a mosque is mekrūh.
Yet it is mustahab to establish a contract for a nikāh.
21 - It is tahrīmī mekrūh to busy with worldly conversations instead of
worshipping in a mosque. As fire consumes wood, worldly conversations in a
mosque removes ones blessings. After worshipping, it is permissible to talk on
permissible matters softly. It is never permissible to talk about matters not
approved of by the Sharīat.
22 - It is mekrūh to reserve a certain place for yourself in a mosque.
But if you leave your coat in your place lest someone else will sit there when
you go out of the mosque, you can sit there again when you come back. The case
is the same in public places, in Minā, on Arafāt [on ships, buses]. That is, if
someone else is sitting in the place where it is your habit to sit, you cannot
force him to stand up. If you reserve more
seats than you need, someone else may take the extra seat. If two people ask
for the extra seat, the one whom you give the seat can sit there. If before
either of the two people asks for the seat one of them sits there, you cannot
take it back and give it to the other person. If you swear to tell the truth
and say, I reserved this seat for him with his instructions and not for
myself, you can make the person leave the seat. The same applies to cases
involving places where sellers set up in a market place; a late comer cannot
force an early comer to leave his place. In all these public places, if the
first occupant has been causing harm to others, he can be forced to leave his
place.
If those who are performing namāz are too closely pressed together,
they can make those who are not performing namāz leave their places.
If a district mosque is too small for a large jamāat, those who do not
live in that district can be made to leave the mosque.
It is permissible [and necessary] for the people in a district to
appoint a mutawallī [administrator] who will collect income for the mosque and
who will take care of its maintenance and other expenditures.
If a hāfiz is reciting the Qurān on one side of the mosque and a pious
Muslim of the Ahl as-Sunnat Madhhab is preaching on another side, it is better
to listen to the preacher. [In fact, if the hāfiz is a fāsiq and is reciting
the Qur'ān melodiously, it is not permissible to listen to him. A 'mosque' does
not mean a building with a dome on top and a minaret adjacent to it'. It means
a building wherein namāz in jamā'at is performed five times daily'. It is also
permissible to preach to the Muslims making up the jamā'at before or after the
prayers. The preaching is performed by a pious Muslim holding the belief of Ahl
as-sunnat; he performs it by reading a passage from a book written by a scholar
of Ahl as-sunnat, or by reciting a statement that was made by that scholar, and
by explaining what he has read or recited. Speeches made by people without a
certain Madhhab or by English spies or by missionaries are not called preaches;
they are called orations or conferences. It is not permissible to make speeches
or conferences in mosques or to listen to such speeches therein. Each and every
statement made by a scholar of Ahl as-sunnat is an explanation based on the Qur'ān al-kerīm and hadīth-i-sherīfs.]
It is permissible to scare away bats and pigeons in a mosque
and to throw out their nests. Otherwise
they will ruin the mosque. They are expelled so that the mosque will remain
clean. It is written in Fatāwā-i qāri-ul-Hidāya[1] and Jawāhir-ul
fatāwa[2]: It is permissible to kill the birds
that spoil a mosque if it is impossible to expell them. Animals that give
trouble to people can be killed anywhere. It is not permissible to destroy
birds nests outside of a mosque.
It is written in the fatwā of Qādīhān (rahmatullāhi
alaih): If the adhān (azān) is not said in a city or village or neighborhood,
the government has to ensure that it is said even by using force. It is
written in Fatāwā-i Hindiyya: The azān
is said outside of the mosque, or on the minaret. It is sunnat to say it at an
elevated place and not to force oneself to make ones voice loud. Hence, it
can be easily understood that there is no need to say the adhān or the iqāmat
through a loud speaker. For the azān is said in every neighborhood. It is bidat
to perform worships with tape recorders, radios and loudspeakers. Bidats are
grave sins. [The azān said by the
muazzin and qirā'at (recital of a sūra or three āyats of the Qur'ān al-kerīm during the standing position in a
namāz) performed by the imām should be made in their natural voices and loud
enough to be heard by the Muslims around the mosque and by the jamā'at therein.
It is makrūh for them to exert themselves so that they will be heard from afar.
This should suffice to show the pointlessness of using loudspeakers in mosques.
It is written as follows in Munjid. "Any instrument that
is used to produce sound is called a 'mizmār'. A drum, a tambourine, a woodwind
instrument such as a reed flute, a violin, a lute, a loud-speaker, a tape
recorder, and a television set are a mizmār each." Ibni Hajar-i-Mekkī
'rahmatullāhi ta'ālā 'alaih, (899 [1494 A.D.] - 974 [1566], Mekka,) states in
his book Keff-ur-reā an muharremāt-ilā
lehw-i-wa-s-simā': "A hadīth-i-sherīf
reads: I have been commanded to annihilate the
drum and the mizmār. And another one reads: 'A time will come when the Qurān al-kerīm will be read (and recited) through mizmārs. Allāhu taālā will damn those who do so and
their listeners.' " Also in this category
is to say the azān or the mawlid (by using a loudspeaker). Please see the
twenty-fourth chapter.]
---------------------------------
[1] Written by 'Umar bin Is-haqq 'rahmatullāhi ta'ālā 'alaih'.
[2] Written by Rukn-ud-dīn Abū Bakr Muhammad bin Abd-ur-Reshīd 'rahmatullāhi ta'ālā 'alaih', (d. 565 [1169 A.D.].)