Sunnat al-Jumuah al-Qabliyyah - within Athar al-Muallimi
- Author died
- 1386 AH
- Editions
- Dār ‘Ālam al-Fawā’id lil-Nashr wa-al-Tawzī‘
Sunnat al-Jumuah al-Qabliyyah (The Pre-Friday Sunnah Prayer) is a legal treatise by the Yemeni hadith scholar and jurist Abd al-Rahman al-Muallimi (1313–1386 AH / 1895–1966 CE) examining whether an established regular sunnah prayer precedes the Friday congregational prayer. It was published posthumously within his collected legal treatises (Majmu Rasa'il al-Fiqh) as part of the multivolume edition Athar al-Muallimi .
Background and Core Arguments
Al-Mu'allimi composed the treatise in response to a question regarding whether the Friday prayer has a prescribed regular prayer before it (sunnah rawatib qabliyyah) . Before addressing the main question directly, he examined the ruling on performing voluntary prayers (al-tanafful) on Friday before the sun reaches its zenith (zawal) and verified the precise entry time of the Friday prayer .
Al-Mu'allimi argued that delaying the Friday adhan until the preacher (khatib) emerges serves as clear evidence against the existence of a regular pre-Friday sunnah . He noted that performing voluntary prayer is prohibited after the khatib comes out; had a pre-Friday regular sunnah been legislated, the adhan would have been prescribed before the preacher's arrival, because the prescribed time for pre-obligatory regular prayers is between the adhan and the iqamah .
Textual Critique and Conclusions
The work provides a detailed critique of the arguments used by scholars who affirm a regular pre-Friday sunnah prayer . Al-Mu'allimi focused particularly on the deduction drawn from the wording found in certain narrations concerning the companion Sulayk al-Ghatafani: أصليت ركعتين قبل أن تجيء؟ ("Did you pray two rak'ahs before coming?") . He demonstrated that the addition قبل أن تجيء ("before coming") is unproven, and that using it to argue for a pre-Friday sunnah is invalid .
Al-Mu'allimi's conclusion aligned with earlier rulings by classical Hanbali scholars such as Ibn Taymiyyah and Ibn al-Qayyim, who also denied the prescription of a regular pre-Friday sunnah . He concluded the treatise by advising worshippers to arrive early at the mosque and engage in general, unrestricted voluntary prayer (nafl mutlaq) until the imam steps out for the sermon, thereby attaining a greater reward . He maintained that refraining from treating pre-Friday prayers as a designated regular sunnah represents obedience to the prophetic practice, whereas persisting in viewing it as such after the evidence is made clear constitutes a violation .
Answer updated