the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, appointed him as his guide. (1)

Fifth: The scholars differed regarding the ruling on seeking treatment with sheep’s urine. The established position in the madhhab is that treatment is permissible only with camel urine. It has also been said that treatment with the urine of any animal whose meat is lawful to eat is permissible. Another view holds that treatment with urine is absolutely impermissible, even camel urine, because they consider it impure. They cite the Prophet’s words, may Allah bless him and grant him peace: “As for one of them, he did not take care to avoid urine.” (2) However, this is a weak view, since one wording of the hadith states: “He did not take care to avoid his own urine.” Treatment with camel urine is established by the sunnah in the account of the people of Uraynah. (3) By analogy, if it were established that sheep’s urine has some benefit, there would be no distinction between it and camel urine.

Visiting the Sick Is Recommended

His statement: “Visiting the sick is recommended.” In the terminology of the jurists, a sunnah is that for which the one who does it is rewarded, while the one who leaves it is not punished. Thus, it is among the encouraged acts, not among the obligatory ones.

The author says, “visiting the sick,” rather than “visiting,” because visitation is for the healthy, whereas visiting in illness is for the sick. It seems that this particular term was chosen for the sick because it implies repetition: it is derived from al-ʿawd (returning), namely, returning to something time after time. Illness may be prolonged, and so a person may need to visit repeatedly.

The author’s statement, “visiting the sick”: the definite article here denotes the genus—that is, whoever has been afflicted by the category of illness. It is also general with regard to the sick person; thus, it is