The Beginning of Guidance with Ustadh Ubaydullah Evans | Session 3

The Beginning of Guidance — Session 3: The Etiquettes of Wuḍū

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ. إِنَّ الْحَمْدَ لِلَّهِ وَنَحْمَدُهُ وَنَسْتَعِينُهُ وَنَسْتَغْفِرُهُ. وَنَعُوذُ بِاللهِ مِنْ شُرُورِ أَنْفُسِنَا وَمِنْ سَيِّئَاتِ أَعْمَالِنَا. فَمَنْ يَهْدِهِ اللهُ فَلَا مُضِلَّ لَهُ، وَمَنْ يُضْلِلْ فَلَا هَادِيَ لَهُ. وَأَشْهَدُ أَنْ لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللهُ وَحْدَهُ لَا شَرِيكَ لَهُ، وَأَشْهَدُ أَنَّ مُحَمَّدًا عَبْدُهُ وَرَسُولُهُ.

As-salāmu ʿalaykum. It is a great honor and a great privilege to be with you as always. It is remarkable to think that we are nearly halfway through — and perhaps more than halfway through, depending upon whether or not the month is 29 days or 30 days — this blessed month of Ramaḍān, and we are soon to enter the last 10 days of Ramaḍān, inshāAllah.

We are still reading the blessed and very accessible book of Imām al-Ghazālī, Bidāyat al-Hidāyah — The Beginning of Guidance — which focuses on the initial steps, the beginning of changing one's life, the beginning of transforming one's religious practice. Going from a religious practice that was maybe just about task and responsibilities — this is how many of us start.

Many of us, initially, when thinking about Allah, when thinking about God, glorified and exalted is He, we think: these are my tasks, these are my duties, these are my responsibilities, these are my obligations. And Imām al-Ghazālī is trying to move us into a place in which we're not thinking about these as duties and tasks and responsibilities and obligations, but etiquettes. These are the etiquettes that I adhere to, to show my devotion to my Creator, so that I don't think about my sins as just rules that were broken, or infractions that were committed, but rather I think about my sins as a bond of love that has been broken.

And I think about my ibādah as acts of devotion, acts of love that I render freely — freely, without any compulsion — to my Creator. And Imām al-Ghazālī is focused on imparting the knowledge that gets us from one part of the day to the other part of the day.

Someone came to Imām Mālik, raḥimahullāh, God have mercy upon him, may God be pleased with him, and they said, "Yā Imām, what is the best thing for me to learn? What is the best thing for me to focus on?" And he didn't tell them any of the branches of fiqh. He didn't tell them any of the specific aḥkām of mirāth, of inheritance. He didn't tell them any of the niceties of theology. He said: learning the knowledge that gets you from one end of the day to the other end of the day in the state of obedience to Allah — this is the most important thing that you can learn.

And this, of course, is only a restating of the hadith of the Prophet ﷺ in which he said: the best thing that you can do —

"Say: there is nothing worthy of worship besides God, and then focus on being an upright person."
(Sunan Ibn Mājah, Hadith 3972)

So these are the etiquettes — these are the ādāb — these are the ways that we focus on being upright and approaching our religious practice in a way that we can grow in our love for it. The Prophet ﷺ talked about those people that experienced the sweetness of Īmān. This is different than doing something just because it's an obligation, or doing something simply to say one did whatever it was they were doing. This is doing something because you love it, because you're committed to it, because you find great purpose in it, or because you find great meaning in it.

The Shaʿīrah of Wuḍū

So today, we're beginning with this great shaʿīrah — this great fundamental aspect of practice — al-wuḍū, the ablution. And the word shaʿīrah — its plural is shaʿāʾir — the shaʿāʾir of Islam. These are things that are associated with the public acknowledgement, the public recognition, the public practice of Islam.

So perhaps the most well-known shaʿīrah is the adhān. Every traveler who visits a Muslim country, a majority Muslim nation, has heard the adhān. This is a shaʿīrah of Islam. Ramaḍān is also a shaʿīrah of Islam. The ṣalāh — these are shaʿāʾir, things that people know Muslims by. The ḥijāb — people know Muslims by this. When people see that, they know, these people are Muslim. Wuḍū is also one of those things.

You know, one of my proudest moments as a Muslim — once I was sitting on a plane, and I believe I was traveling to Cincinnati, and I was reading from the muṣḥaf, and there was a Chinese woman sitting beside me, and she said, "What are you reading?" And I knew that she was either new to the United States or just visiting the United States, because generally speaking, religious practice is something that we don't ask each other about in the U.S. — this is relegated to the realm of the personal. But she asked in a very earnest way, and you could tell by the way she asked the question, she did not think that her question was inappropriate.

I said, "This is the Qur'an." And I'm very careful — whenever I am mentioning Arabic terms to non-Arabic speakers, I always anglicize the terms. I say them with English letters. I don't say al-Qurʾān — I say the Qur'an. So that people know that you're speaking with them and not speaking to them. She said, "Oh, the book of Muslims." I said, "Yes." I said, "Do you know anything about Muslims?" She was from southern China, the region around Guangzhou. She said, "Very little. But when I do see them, I always see them cleaning themselves. I see them — when I do see them in parks — washing, cleaning themselves. And when we see this, we say to ourselves: wow, these people really like to be clean. They really like to purify themselves."

Now she didn't know that she was talking about wuḍū. But I knew that she was talking about wuḍū. And I thought to myself: this is a beautiful thing to be known by in the dunyā. That people would know — purification is half of one's faith. The Prophet ﷺ said that. And Allah loves the mutaṭahhirīn — Allah loves those who purify themselves.

One of the distinct aspects of the Sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ was being very careful about purification, about ṭahārah. And many of our spiritual masters say that the ṭahārah is the miftāḥ — the key — to the ṣalāh. And the ṣalāh is the key to everything else. So you will find that someone who is very careful about their wuḍū is very careful about their prayer. And a person who is very careful about their prayer is very careful about their dīn.

The Virtues (Faḍāʾil) of Wuḍū

So today we're talking about wuḍū. And wuḍū has great faḍīlah. Before we look at the ādāb that Imām al-Ghazālī mentions, we want to mention some of the faḍāʾil of wuḍū.

Recognition by the Prophet ﷺ on the Day of Judgment

One of the greatest of them — perhaps in my estimation the greatest of them — is that this is the means by which we will be recognized by the Prophet ﷺ. The Prophet ﷺ talked about the ghurrah — the blaze of the horse. And this analogy is lost on you if you don't understand the context in which the Prophet ﷺ is speaking. He's speaking about the horse. And the Arabs loved horses, and they still do. And even now, the most prized stallion is the Arabian stallion. And when you're looking at the coat of a horse, one of the most beautiful aspects is the white blaze that goes up the front of the horse's face — the blaze.

The Prophet ﷺ said: the people of wuḍū — aṣḥāb al-wuḍū — they will be shining on Yawm al-Qiyāmah. And the limbs that were washed in the wuḍū will be shining forth — the arms, the head, the feet, the hands — and he said the face will have a blaze, almost like the blaze of the horse, from wuḍū. And the Prophet ﷺ said this is the means by which he will identify and recognize those members of his ummah.

Cleansing of Minor Sins

The Prophet ﷺ taught us that when one makes wuḍū, all of the ṣaghāʾir — all of the minor sins — are cleansed. Our ʿulamāʾ divide sin into ṣaghāʾir and kabāʾir — minor and major sins. And the most important difference between minor and major sins is that major sins require a specific, intentional repentance. One has to make tawbah with the conditions of tawbah: remorse, stopping the action, vowing to God never to return to the action, and then sitting right with any individual one wronged — mending fences. These are the conditions of tawbah that we have to fulfill if we commit a major act of disobedience.

But minor acts of disobedience — those perhaps imperceptible sins that we commit, not even aware that we've committed them — maybe looking at somebody in a way that the Prophet ﷺ said causes them harm, maybe things we gazed upon that we shouldn't have been looking at, maybe things we've listened to that we shouldn't have been listening to, maybe things we've uttered. The Prophet ﷺ said: a person will speak a word not even thinking about what they're saying, and the person will be punished on account of this thing that they said flippantly, inadvertently, unintentionally. So wuḍū cleanses us of all of those minor sins. This is the faḍīlah of wuḍū.

Wuḍū Changes One's State

The Prophet ﷺ talked about wuḍū as something that can change the state of an individual. The Prophet ﷺ said: if one is angry, he should make wuḍū — she should make wuḍū. Wuḍū cools. It calms. And the Prophet ﷺ's wuḍū was almost always with cool or cold water.

Wuḍū Unlocks Acts of Worship

The Prophet ﷺ mentioned that there is a special place on Qiyāmah for people who remain perpetually in wuḍū — they're always in a state of wuḍū. We know that wuḍū unlocks for us the ibādah: whether we're talking about reading from the muṣḥaf — if we want to handle the muṣḥaf, we have to be in a state of wuḍū — if we want to enter a state of prayer, we have to be in a state of wuḍū, if we want to circumambulate the Kaʿbah, we have to be in a state of wuḍū.

In addition to those things that must be done with wuḍū, everything else that you do with wuḍū — its value is enhanced. So the duʿāʾ that you make in wuḍū is better than the duʿāʾ that you make when you're not in a state of wuḍū. The dhikr that you make in wuḍū is better than the dhikr that you make when you're not in a state of wuḍū. The ṣalawāt on the Prophet that you make in a state of wuḍū are better than the ṣalawāt that you make when you are not in a state of wuḍū.

The Siwāk (Tooth Stick)

Imām al-Ghazālī mentions:

"When you have finished in the restroom and are now going to prepare for your wuḍū, the first thing that you should do is use the siwāk — cleaning the teeth — for indeed it freshens the mouth, it is pleasing to the Lord, and it angers the devil."
(Referenced in Bidāyat al-Hidāyah of Imām al-Ghazālī)

The Prophet ﷺ was very serious about oral hygiene — and I assure you, this is not an endorsement paid for by any of my dentist friends nor any of my orthodontist friends. Oral hygiene and being keen to focus on one's oral health is a firmly established sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ. The Prophet ﷺ actually said:

"If it were not for my avoidance of creating hardship for my community, I would have ordered them to clean their teeth before every prayer."
(Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī, Hadith 887; Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, Hadith 252)

Look at this hadith of the Prophet ﷺ: it freshens the breath, it is something that God is pleased with, and it is something that angers the Shayṭān. Why? Because if a person is conscientious about these details, then you know that they're going to pay very close attention to the major things.

I understand that part of a modern disposition toward religion is: why are we paying attention to all of these obscure details? I've even heard some people use the term "obscurantism." Who cares about water and washing and nostrils and rinsing mouths and making sure that we get a fourth of the head — and some men have three hairs, another man has the entire head — who cares about making sure that we wash our ankles? What about those core messages of faith, of love, of universal brotherhood and sisterhood? What about the big things? Why are we focusing on these small things?

The secret is: if you focus on the small things, then you know that you're going to be focused on the big things. But if you begin to neglect the small things, this is what we call a madkhal min madākhil al-Shayṭān — an opening from the openings of Shayṭān.

I was listening once to a radio program, and they were interviewing — and this has very interesting application and significance — a transgender professor that was teaching at a Jewish college. The professor was asked about their experience at the college, and they said that yes, they found it very difficult to be there because there was much about their gender expression and identity that was challenged by that context. However, one of the things that they benefited from — I will never forget this for as long as I live — was that in that tradition, something as simple as lighting the menorah, the candles displayed for Hanukkah, has to be done at a specific time in a specific way. And the professor said: for my Jewish students, the way that they light this menorah matters — something as simple as that matters. By extension, you know that they know that their lives matter. If this is significant — like the way that we light this menorah is significant — then certainly their lives contain great significance. The professor said, "In some of the secular institutions in which I've taught, I've actually had a very difficult time convincing people that their lives mattered beyond empty careerism and consumption."

When we talk about these small details — like using the siwāk — it's not to lose sight of the bigger themes of our faith tradition. But if these things are important to us — sighting the moon for Ramaḍān, using the siwāk, making sure that we washed everything that was supposed to be washed in wuḍū, facing the qiblah, reciting from the Qurʾān with tajwīd — if these things are important to us, this is in a sense reflecting that life is important to us. This all has meaning. All of this is being done for a wise purpose.

Imām al-Ghazālī also mentions another hadith from the Prophet ﷺ that has some weakness in its chain:

"Performing the prayer after using the siwāk is seventy times better than performing a prayer in which one did not use the siwāk."
(Referenced in Bidāyat al-Hidāyah of Imām al-Ghazālī; narrated by Aḥmad and al-Bayhaqī with some weakness in the chain)

The other thing I want to say about the siwāk before I move on: when you look at the sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ with regard to appearance and hygiene, almost all of it is about honoring the other. This is a way that you honor other people. The Prophet ﷺ — in an authentic hadith — a man came to him ﷺ seeking a rukhṣah, a dispensation about coming to the masjid for ṣalāh. He was blind and said, "I don't always find people to lead me to the prayer, and it's very difficult for me to get to the prayer — will you relax this for me?" And the Prophet ﷺ said: "If people knew what was in the first rows of the prayer in the masjid, they would come to them crawling."

This is the faḍīlah of praying in the masjid — the virtue of praying in the masjid was such that when a blind man came to the Prophet ﷺ and asked that this be relaxed for him because he had a special circumstance, the Prophet ﷺ — who is Nabiy al-Raḥmah, the Prophet of Mercy — wanted to emphasize to this man: if you can make it to the masjid, if you can have someone guide you, you should avail yourself of the opportunity to pray in the masjid because praying in the masjid is that virtuous. And yet the Prophet ﷺ pointed at garlic and onions and said: if one of you has consumed either of these, let him refrain from attending ṣalāh at the masjid until he has cleansed his mouth — because this would be a distraction, a disturbance to other people praying.

So one of the reasons we use the siwāk is, of course, that Allah is pleased with it; the devil sees that if we're paying attention to these small details, we're going to be paying attention to the larger themes of our faith — but also it's just about respecting other people. Not wanting to be disagreeable in the presence of other people. The Prophet ﷺ would tell people to apply perfume because the angels like it. This is a major paradigm shift: when we think about appearance, we think about self-aggrandizement. We never think about appearance as a means of honoring the other — even if that other is in the angelic realm. This is the sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ.

Beginning Wuḍū: The Intention and Supplication

Imām al-Ghazālī mentions that when you begin your wuḍū, you should mention the basmalah — بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ — and recite:

"O my Lord, I seek refuge in You from the whisperings of the devils, and I seek refuge in You, my Lord, from their presence."

And then one is to begin their wuḍū. Imām al-Ghazālī also mentions that before entering into a state of making wuḍū, your niyyah should be to make prayer permissible for oneself, or to make handling the muṣḥaf permissible for oneself, or to enhance your spiritual work — be it dhikr, or tadabbur, or tafakkur, or whatever it is you're doing. And then he mentions that for every member of your body that you wash in the wuḍū, you should have a specific duʿāʾ that you're making to Allah: something for your face and for your eyes, something for your ears and for your mouth, something for your hands and for your arms, something for your head, something for your feet.

The Farāʾiḍ, Sunan, and Mutammimāt of Wuḍū

The reason I mention that wuḍū has its farāʾiḍ — its obligations — its sunan — its prophetic elements — and its mutammimāt — those aspects of completion — is that if one of us learned to make wuḍū and we thought that everything was wājib, that would be okay. If a person believed that washing everything three times was absolutely required — even though in every madhhab you only have to wash one time — that would be okay. If a person believed that istinshāq — lightly drawing water into the nose — was wājib, that would be okay. If a person believed that madhmaḍah — rinsing the mouth — was wājib, that would be okay. If a person believed that wiping the entire head was wājib, that would be okay.

And that's why I'm always wary about teaching the fiqh of wuḍū, because people always come to recognize: wait, you mean to tell me a lot of the stuff that I thought was an absolute obligation is really sunnah? And then you see that wuḍū begin to change — instead of wiping three times they begin wiping once, they don't rinse the nose, they stop wiping in the ears, they stop wiping behind the ears, they don't wash each member fully. So if you thought that everything that you've been shown in wuḍū was wājib — that's okay.

A Brief Note on the Madhāhib and Wuḍū

Every madhhab has its arkān — the pillars of wuḍū — and these differ slightly from Islamic legal school to Islamic legal school. In the Ḥanafī school, for instance, niyyah is not a condition of wuḍū. One does not need a specific niyyah to make wuḍū. Imām Abū Ḥanīfah, in his brilliance and practicality, said the point is to actually purify the limbs — so that if one is caught in a storm, or somehow immersed in water even without the specific intention of istiḥābat al-ṣalāt — making prayer permissible — you still have wuḍū. In the Mālikī, Shāfiʿī, and Ḥanbalī schools, niyyah is a part of wuḍū — you have to have a specific niyyah for taʿabbud, for an act of worship, in order to make wuḍū. In the Mālikī school, rubbing is a condition of wuḍū — everything that is washed must be rubbed. In the Shāfiʿī school, tartīb — the order of wuḍū — is important; wuḍū must be made in order. My point is that much of what we know in terms of how to make wuḍū applies to every madhhab. You do have those specific points in each madhhab, but for the most part the way that we've been taught to make wuḍū would be valid in every single madhhab.

Seven Things to Avoid When Making Wuḍū

Imām al-Ghazālī mentions seven things that you want to avoid while making wuḍū. Let me go over them briefly.

1. Being Wasteful with Water

Shaking your hands and being wasteful with the water. A firmly established sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ with regard to wuḍū is taqmīr al-māʾ — not being wasteful with the water. Someone once came to ʿĀʾishah and they said that the sunnah of the Prophet was to wash the hands and then begin with excessive amounts of water. Without even asking about who they heard it from, without even checking its sanād, ʿĀʾishah rejected it and said: the Prophet did not come to put ḥaraj — he did not come to put hardship in the dīn. In a desert environment, being wasteful with water would have been akin to putting hardship in the dīn. For us, almost all of us make wuḍū from running water, from faucets — making sure that the faucet is not at full blast; it doesn't have to be a drip, but this would be just a reminder of the sunnah of the Prophet in the way that one uses the water.

لَا تَنْفُضْ يَدَيْكَ — don't shake your hands, as if being wasteful with the water.

2. Smacking the Face with Water

لَا تَلْطُمْ وَجْهَكَ وَلَا رَأْسَكَ بِالْمَاءِ لَطْمًا — don't smack your face with the water. Everything done in wuḍū should be done with waqār — with dignity, with serenity. You're preparing for prayer, for dhikr, for reading from the muṣḥaf — it should not be done with excess vigor. Once I was at the masjid and I was sitting next to someone making wuḍū, and he was making wuḍū so vigorously that it was almost like he made my wuḍū for me — after he finished making wuḍū, I had water all over me. Don't smack your face with the water; move with waqār, with serenity.

3. Talking During Wuḍū

وَلَا تَتَكَلَّمْ فِي أَثْنَاءِ الْوُضُوءِ — do not talk as you're making wuḍū. The wuḍū in and of itself is an act of ibādah — it's an act of ibādah in and of itself. In the same way that we would not talk during the prayer, we should be careful not to talk during wuḍū. This is not the time to listen to your voicemails on your telephone. This is not the time to look up and scold your children. This is not the time to engage in conversation with your spouse. This is wuḍū — we're supposed to be settling into a mind state of solemnity, preparing for worship.

4. Washing Any Limb More Than Three Times

وَلَا تَزِيدُ فِي الْغَسْلِ عَلَى ثَلَاثِ مَرَّاتٍ — don't wash anything more than three times. In fact, the great scholar al-ʿIzz ibn ʿAbd al-Salām, when talking about bidʿah — many of us toss the word bidʿah around and we don't have any clue what we're even talking about. A bidʿah is something that is done in contravention to the sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ — it is mukhālif al-sunnah — and the person doing it thinks that they are being rewarded for it. The example he gives: it's like somebody making wuḍū who, instead of washing each limb three times, says "I'm going to do it six times," and thinks that this is somehow more virtuous than what the Prophet ﷺ did. This is a bidʿah. And of course, with the head, it is only once.

5. Excessive Pouring of Water Due to Waswasah

وَلَا تُفْرِطْ فِي صَبِّ الْمَاءِ مِنْ غَيْرِ حَاجَةٍ — don't pour the water without necessity, because you might be muwaswas — someone experiencing lots of demonic suggestion and insinuation, given to excessive self-doubt.

There are in every madhhab — though I'm more familiar with the aḥkām in the Mālikī school — rulings for people who are muwaswas. For instance, in the Mālikī school, you have to make sure that all of the surface area of every limb of the body that Allah has commanded us to wash in wuḍū is covered with water. A person that is muwaswas is a person who's always asking: wait a minute, did I get between my fingers? Did I cover every part? Interestingly enough, in the Mālikī school, washing between the fingers is wājib, whereas washing between the toes is sunnah.

The reason I didn't go over each aspect of wuḍū is I want to keep this about etiquette and I don't want to turn this into a fiqh class — that is not what we're doing in the Ramaḍān immersion. We're looking at the ādāb of wuḍū, not the fiqh of wuḍū. That's a different class, and I would be honored to teach it.

For a person who is muwaswas — dealing with lots of devilish or demonic insinuation that creates a lot of self-doubt — they say that if this happens to a person at least once a day, at least once every five prayers, the person is in doubt about: did I wash this? Did I wash that? Or: did I pray four rakʿāt or did I pray three? — this is a person who is classified in the Mālikī school as muwaswas, and that person has special aḥkām that other people do not have.

So for the muwaswas person: if they doubt their wuḍū but they know they made it — just pray. Don't allow that to stop you — just pray. This is waswasah. The same thing is true for their wuḍū: if you know that you washed the arm and you have this doubt — "wait a minute, I missed my forearm" — don't go back and wash the arm again. Just keep going. This is waswasah. For everybody else, you actually have to go back and wash — or you should take the least number of rakʿāt that you know you prayed and build upon that. But the muwaswas has special rulings.

6. Making Wuḍū with Water Heated by the Sun

لَا تَتَوَضَّأْ بِالْمَاءِ الْمُشَمَّسِ — don't make wuḍū with water that has been heated by the sun. This is one of those old rulings in which it was believed that al-māʾ al-mushammas causes leprosy — people used to believe that making wuḍū with water heated by the sun caused leprosy, a skin condition. This was something that the Ṣaḥābah would avoid, and it is something that has been codified in the madhhab.

7. Making Wuḍū from Gold or Silver Vessels

وَلَا مِنَ الْأَوَانِي الصُّفْرِيَّةِ — don't make wuḍū from extravagant vessels — gold and silver vessels — in the same way that the Muslim is not to eat from gold and silver. And don't worry — 99% of the silverware that we use is not real silver. When people hear that hadith, they get scared: "We're not supposed to eat with gold and silver?" That's not actually silver.

These are seven things that one should avoid when making wuḍū.

Questions and Answers

Do These Seven Things Break One's Wuḍū?

There was a question about whether those seven things break one's wuḍū — no, they don't break one's wuḍū. These are seven ādāb — seven things that the Imām was saying one wants to avoid when making wuḍū — not that they break your wuḍū. If a person makes wuḍū from a gold vessel, or a silver vessel, or a person talks during wuḍū, their wuḍū is still valid. It's not nullified — but it is bad adab with regard to wuḍū. Very good question.

Can Waswasah Be Self-Diagnosed?

Yes, waswasah can be self-diagnosed — in every madhhab it might be different, so be sure to check with the scholarship that you trust. But I know in the Mālikī school, if a person experiences this kind of self-doubt at least once a day — if this happens to you every day at least once, you're thinking: "wait, did I pray three or four? wait, did I wash my hands?" — this is enough for a person to be considered muwaswas, and that person has special aḥkām.

I think about it as something quite beautiful about our tradition: if somebody is suffering from this kind of nervous anxiety, they have a different set of rulings. For everyone else — this never happens to you, you make wuḍū and you're pretty sure: I washed my right hand, then I washed my left — but then one day you're like, "wait a minute, did I wash my left elbow?" In every madhhab, you have to then go back and wash, because order is a condition of wuḍū and continuity is also a condition of wuḍū. So you have to start over. You have to have certainty that you're in a state of wuḍū in order to enter the prayer — you can't pray if you're thinking "do I have wuḍū?"

So for a regular person — a person who does not suffer from that nervous condition — you have to go back and repeat. But for a person to whom this happens every day: no, we're not going to allow your religious practice to become a source of anxiety for you. This is a shayṭān that's making this difficult for you. So if you're thinking, "wait, did I wash my arm?" — you did, now go pray. That's the madhhab. If you think, "wait, did I pray three rakʿāt or four?" — it's four — if this happens to you every day.

Wiping Over Socks in Wuḍū

This is a major issue in fiqh, and if you understand this masʾalah well, it is an entire lesson in comparative fiqh.

Allah says in the Qurʾān, when preparing for prayer, to wash your feet up to the kaʿb — up to the ankle. Allah says this in the Qurʾān — it is mentioned in the muḥkamāt — it is a naṣṣ of the Qurʾān. However, the hadith of the Prophet ﷺ wiping over the khuffayn — the leather socks — those hadith are mutawātir: they have been conveyed with multiple authentic chains.

In all of the madhāhib, a hadith that is at the level of tawātur — what we call mutawātir, diversely congruent, conveyed with many different authentic chains — can make takhṣīṣ of a verse of the Qurʾān; it can alter how we understand the verse. So because the hadith of the Prophet ﷺ wiping over the leather socks is at the highest level of authenticity, we can look at this verse of the Qurʾān and say: this hadith can specify what is meant — unless you're wearing these leather socks. That is why wiping over leather socks is permissible in every madhhab — except the Shīʿa. The Jaʿfarīs don't accept that; you will never see a Shīʿī wiping over leather socks.

Now, there is a hadith of the Prophet ﷺ wiping over the jawrab — not the khuf. The khuf is the leather sock; the jawrab is the fabric sock, the cotton sock. There is a hadith of the Prophet ﷺ wiping over the jawrab — but that hadith is not mutawātir; it is āḥad — singularly transmitted. That is not a sufficient ḥujjiyyah — it does not have the evidentiary value to specify what is conveyed by the Qurʾān. So in almost all of the madhāhib, wiping over the cotton sock is not acceptable — except among some Ḥanbalīs, who allow the singularly transmitted hadith to specify what is intended by a verse of the Qurʾān. And by extension, the Salafīs — the Ahl al-Ḥadīth — following that precedent of the Ḥanbalīs, also wipe over the cotton sock.

Now I want to say this: this should not be something that creates conflict or division in our Islamic centers, in our masājid. We should not allow this to create separation. There are other aḥkām about wuḍū — the nosebleed, for instance: in the Ḥanafī school, if blood runs from the nose it breaks the wuḍū; in the Mālikī school, it does not. In the Ḥanafī school, a man touching his genitals does not break the wuḍū; in the Mālikī school, it does. My point is that we might pray behind people who, according to our madhhab, do not have wuḍū or whose wuḍū has not been completed correctly.

Ṣalāh behind any of the people of the qiblah is acceptable. And if you really are a person of caution — "I think the imām wiped over his cotton socks and I don't know if he really had wuḍū" — don't raise your voice and say anything that would create discord among the Muslims. Just go to a private place, or go off to a corner, and just repeat your prayer without making any issue of it. Do not allow these aḥkām to be sources of division in our community.

Can You Make Masaḥ Over Shoes?

The conservative position is: if those shoes are leather and cover the ankle like a khuf, and you put them on in a state of wuḍū like a khuf, and you have not removed them like a khuf, and you intend to pray in them like a khuf — then you can wipe over the shoe. They apply to the shoe all of the awṣāf, all of the characteristics of the khuf: if it's leather like the khuf, if it covers the ankle like the khuf, if you put it on in a state of wuḍū like the khuf, you have not removed it like the khuf, you intend to pray in it like the khuf — then you can make masaḥ over shoes.

Do I Have to Say My Shahādah to Be a Muslim?

Yes and no. You have to say your shahādah publicly to be recognized as a Muslim — and that is what you should do. To be recognized as a Muslim, to be a member of the community, you have to say your shahādah. If one testifies to the Oneness of Allah in their heart and to the messengership and the culmination of prophecy being in the Prophet Muḥammad ﷺ, they are a Muslim — and inshāAllah they will be raised among Muslims on Yawm al-Qiyāmah, even if they never articulated that. However, in order for the Muslims to give them their rights — to give them their janāzah, to bury them with Muslims, to identify them as a Muslim, to pray for them, because we know that they passed away as a Muslim — something must be done publicly.

But if a person testifies to the Oneness of Allah in their heart and to the prophecy of the Prophet Muḥammad ﷺ in their heart and never says anything — inshāAllah that will be enough to be raised as a Muslim on Yawm al-Qiyāmah. But you should do it publicly, inshāAllah.

Āmīn. Wa-s-salāmu ʿalaykum wa-raḥmatullāhi wa-barakātuh.