14 replies to this topic

[HAROON RASOOL]

Asar Prayer Time, Which School of Thought is more Correct? According to Quran and Hadiths? Help much appreciated.

Hanafi, Hanbali, Shafi`i, and Maliki schools of thought

The time period within which the Asr prayer must be recited is the following:

Time begins: The Sunni schools differ on when the time begins. The Maliki, Shafi`i, and Hanbali schools say it is at the time when the length of any object's shadow equals the length of the object itself plus the length of that object's shadow at noon.

The dominant opinion in the Hanafi school says it begins when the length of any object's shadow is twice the length of the object plus the length of that object's shadow at noon.[4]

Time ends: Once the sun has completely set below the horizon. However, it is frowned upon (and sinful in the Maliki school) to delay the prayer without a legitimate excuse to the point of the day in which the sun turns a pale red or orange color as it begins to set, though it would still be considered to have been prayed on time.

The Islamic prophet Muhammad said, "He who observes Al-Bardan (i.e., Fajr and `Asr prayers) will enter Jannah.Sahih Bukhari and Muslim, Narrated by Abu Musa. In another hadith: Muhammad said 'He who misses his Asr Salah (i.e. reads it after its specified time) is as if he has lost his wife, children and all his wealth.’ (Sahih Muslim)

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asr

[platinum786]

There is a general concensus within sunni's to accept the teachings of all 4 schools correct. They are based on the understandings of the materials available to the individual imams and the disciplines they applied to derive their rulings. These imams are the greatest scholars in Islamic history, there is no right and wrong in the issue. It is a case of following the teachings of any 1 school. I was at lecture a while back and the alim delivering the lecture as part of the Q&A suggested that if a suni muslim lives in a country which is hanafi, then it is best for him to follow the hanafi fiqh, but if he lives in a majority shafi community and cannot get access to clear access to hanafi rulings, then it is important that he follows shafi rulings. He is a hanafi, he is not suggesting picking and choosing, merely that all 4 are considered equally as valid and authentic by the others.

[HAROON RASOOL]

Thanks for your reply but in my heading I have clearly asked, "Which one is more accurate and clear to estimate the Asar prayer time"? At the moment the difference between the timings of Asar prayer is almost one hour in London. I hope you get my point.

[Awam]

To my understanding, declaring one imam more accurate means declaring the others less accurate.

Now consider that the material, knowledge & understanding (with respect to its freshness and accuracy in that era) is not possible today. So on what basis one can declare one imam less accurate? Today who is more capable than any of these imams (r.a.) ?

Now come to the current question. I believe that without considering the degree of accuracy, I should completely follow the school of thought which I am practicing in my daily life. If I am following hanafi fiqh in my daily life like nikkah, talaq, ibadaat, roza, zakat etc. then I must follow the hanafi ruling on this specific issue. Otherwise I will do something wrong. I have to follow either set of rule completely. I can not pick and choose the rulings of my convenience or understanding like a Salad Bar.

Sorry I am not suggesting. Just telling what I think about this.

Allah forgive me if I understood or said something wrong.

[butterfly]

Does all this trivial nonsense matter? Try to fix yourself and your family that's more important and when you hearths ahzan go pray. Allah knows best and he listens to prayers of the worst of us. Don't focus on disunity.

[Awam]

^^ with due respect, aren't we oversimplifying the whole thing.

Brother Haroon is curious and we should not curb his right to question. Unfortunately our molvis snatched the right to question from us.

I fully understand the good spirit of your message but being a good Pakistani and acting good is not enough. I must have the knowledge of rules and regulations of my country, the knowledge of my right and duties and the legal procedures of doing things in Pakistan. It's not bad.

One clarification, Imam Abu Hanifa, Imam Ahmad ibn Hambal, Imam Shafi, Imam Malik were very respected great scholars who explained each and every bits and bytes of Islam for common man. They are not symbols of disunity. Also not compulsory to follow.

If I want to stay out of any fiqh it is still OK but difficult because then I have to find solution of every situation in life by myself.

[platinum786]

Matters of the Deen are not trivial.

[HAROON RASOOL]

@ Awam: thanks for your kind reply. I am myself a hafiz of Quran but my teachers did not follow any school of thought/madhab which is good and bad for me because now I look at things from my own point of view.

Actually my mom always scold me that I do not pray Asar prayer in time. I tried to convince her that we the people of subcontinent follow the teachings of the honourable Imam Abu Hanifah and thus pray Asar after other school of thoughts. She is not convinced though and then I thought why not ask you guys about your opinions.

I do respect all the Imams but as one hadith goes like that one out of two mujtahids whose ijtihad proved to be more correct/practical of the time than the other will get a double sawab. Hope you guys get my point. So, in this scenario one vs three imams, only one party is more correct/practical than the others.

[Saqr]

You're going to have to ask this question to a Mujtahid who is well-versed in all 4 schools.

[Sanguine]

A superficial glance at different opinions of scholars cannot tell you which opinion is more correct. The way to do it is to do the research and go through the arguments including the traditions on which these scholars have relied and the authenticity of those traditions. Otherwise there is no way you can find out who is more correct over a certain issue. If you cant do that, you should perhaps do taqleed then.

[joshi]

which app on android is best for this, i have tried a number of them with the same settings for hanafi and they all come with different times.

[haroons222]

My brother is going towards religious educated. His teacher is Maliki himself, so my brother asked him.Can i become a maliki?

The Aalim said, NO..you were raised with Hannafi practices, your family and culture has hannafi practices, just stick to that.

POINT BEING,Sunni consider all schools to be right.They have DIFFERENCE OF OPINION,but as long as you FOLLOW ONE, you are fine.Dont pick and choose, (that requires a very high level of education) pick one and stick to it.

Haroon Rasool,If you pray the Hannafi way,if most things you do in life are according to Hannafi school, stick to that.Its just more convenient than convenience of one prayer time.You can always pray Qaza,if you cant make at the hannafi or shaafi time.Allah is more forgiving and understanding then we tend to think:).

[Sanguine]

haroons222, on 02 August 2012 - 01:25 AM, said:

My brother is going towards religious educated. His teacher is Maliki himself, so my brother asked him.Can i become a maliki?

The Aalim said, NO..you were raised with Hannafi practices, your family and culture has hannafi practices, just stick to that.

POINT BEING,Sunni consider all schools to be right.They have DIFFERENCE OF OPINION,but as long as you FOLLOW ONE, you are fine.Dont pick and choose, (that requires a very high level of education) pick one and stick to it.

Haroon Rasool,If you pray the Hannafi way,if most things you do in life are according to Hannafi school, stick to that.Its just more convenient than convenience of one prayer time.You can always pray Qaza,if you cant make at the hannafi or shaafi time.Allah is more forgiving and understanding then we tend to think:).

I wonder why your brother wanted to be Maliki and why his teacher wanted him to follow the Hanfi school of thought, just because he was brought up as a Hanfi.  You do taqleed or you dont, it does  not make much difference. Plus, following different school of thought does not require some extraordinarily high level of understanding. Rationally speaking, its impossible to follow one school of thought in all matters. In Pakistan, its the Hanafi fiqh that is usually followed. But Maulana Ashraf Ali Thanvi (a hardcore Hanfi) and then our courts had to switch to Maliki school of thought when they had to decide how much a woman is supposed to wait whose husband goes missing . Imam Abu Hanifa says that she should wait 90 years. Now thats hell lot of time and these days there are hardly any women who make it to 90. So our courts switched to Imam Malik's ijtihad that she should wait for 4 or 7 years (dont remember the exact period now), not to forget it was done for public interest. My teacher says that switching to different school of thought for individual interest is haram. I dont know if its true or not.

Btw how many of us pray the Hanfi way, esp the ones residing in Pakistan?? I have observed that we pray the way we see our parents praying. Its neither Hanfi, nor Shafi or any other Imam's way. God knows what it is.

[HAROON RASOOL]

Fatima47, on 03 August 2012 - 09:58 AM, said:

I wonder why your brother wanted to be Maliki and why his teacher wanted him to follow the Hanfi school of thought, just because he was brought up as a Hanfi.  You do taqleed or you dont, it does  not make much difference. Plus, following different school of thought does not require some extraordinarily high level of understanding. Rationally speaking, its impossible to follow one school of thought in all matters. In Pakistan, its the Hanafi fiqh that is usually followed. But Maulana Ashraf Ali Thanvi (a hardcore Hanfi) and then our courts had to switch to Maliki school of thought when they had to decide how much a woman is supposed to wait whose husband goes missing . Imam Abu Hanifa says that she should wait 90 years. Now thats hell lot of time and these days there are hardly any women who make it to 90. So our courts switched to Imam Malik's ijtihad that she should wait for 4 or 7 years (dont remember the exact period now), not to forget it was done for public interest. My teacher says that switching to different school of thought for individual interest is haram. I dont know if its true or not.

Btw how many of us pray the Hanfi way, esp the ones residing in Pakistan?? I have observed that we pray the way we see our parents praying. Its neither Hanfi, nor Shafi or any other Imam's way. God knows what it is.

Exactly, as I described in my earlier post

Quote

I do respect all the Imams but as one hadith goes like that one out of two mujtahids whose ijtihad proved to be more correct/practical of the time than the other will get a double sawab. Hope you guys get my point. So, in this scenario one vs three imams, only one party is more correct/practical than the others.

Also as far as the Talaq(divorse) is concerned the courts in Pakistan do not follow the Hanafi fiqah because it is too harsh and somehow contrary to the Quran.

[aamirzs]

Both are ... your choice who you want to follow.