Salat al-Kusuf
- Author died
- 1440 AH
- Editions
- Matba'at Safeer
Salat al-Kusuf (Arabic: صلاة الكسوف, lit. 'The Eclipse Prayer') is a concise treatise on the legal rulings and spiritual dimensions of the eclipse prayer by the Saudi scholar Saeed bin Wahf al-Qahtani (d. 1440 AH / 2018 CE) .
Composition and Purpose
The work bears the full subtitle Mafhum, wa-Asbab, wa-Adab, wa-Ayat, wa-Hikam, wa-Ahkam fi Daw' al-Kitab wa-al-Sunnah ("Concept, Causes, Etiquettes, Signs, Wisdoms, and Rulings in Light of the Quran and Sunnah") and forms the thirty-eighth installment in the author's published series of treatises (Silsilat Mu'allafat Sa'id ibn 'Ali ibn Wahf al-Qahtani) . Al-Qahtani finalized the text after the afternoon prayer on Monday, 18 Muharram 1423 AH .
Contents and Method
The treatise covers the jurisprudence and theological context of solar and lunar eclipses, addressing:
- The linguistic and technical concepts of solar eclipses (kusuf) and lunar eclipses (khusuf), establishing that both are divine signs through which God instills fear in His servants .
- The physical (hissiyyah) and religious (shar'iyyah) causes of eclipses, along with their divine wisdoms and benefits .
- The legal status (hukm) of the eclipse prayer, its obligatory and recommended etiquettes, its timing, and its prescribed manner of performance .
- Specific legal rulings, such as the requirement that a unit of prayer (rak'ah) is only attained by catching the first bowing (ruku'), as well as scholarly disagreements regarding prayer during other cosmic signs (al-salat li-l-ayat) .
In his methodology, al-Qahtani pairs each legal issue with its textual evidence from the Quran and Sunnah or its underlying reasoning, relying heavily on the legal assessments and conclusions of his teacher Abd al-Aziz ibn Abd Allah ibn Baz .
Answer updated