So, if they go out only a short distance from the built-up area, it is not valid. However, the view adopted by the author is correct, as evidenced by the fact that the Messenger ﷺ would go out to the prayer-ground on the days of Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha. (1)

If their number falls below the required minimum before they complete it, they must begin the Zuhr prayer anew...

His statement, “If their number falls below the required minimum before they complete it, they must begin the Zuhr prayer anew”: “their number falls below” refers to the stipulated number; that is, if their number decreases by one or more, they must begin the Zuhr prayer anew. In other words, their prayer is invalidated, and they are required to begin Zuhr again.

For example, they begin the Jumu‘ah prayer with forty people, then one of them breaks his ritual purity and leaves. They must then begin Zuhr anew, because the required number must be present from the beginning of the prayer until its end.

His statement, “they must begin the Zuhr prayer anew,” excludes the case in which there is sufficient time to repeat it as Jumu‘ah. Thus, if there is enough time to repeat the Jumu‘ah prayer—for instance, if the man who left to perform ablution returns while there is still sufficient time—they must hold it as Jumu‘ah, because Jumu‘ah is the obligatory prayer of that time and it is possible to establish it. Therefore, the author’s statement is not unrestricted; rather, it is qualified as applying when it is not possible to repeat it as Jumu‘ah.

Some scholars say instead that they should complete it as Jumu‘ah, because the prayer was validly commenced; invalidating it after it has validly commenced requires evidence. If there is no evidence, its latter part is built upon its former part.

The third view is a middle position—and it is generally the case that the middle position among the views of scholars is the correct and preponderant one—