however, may Allah have mercy on him, re-interpreted the ḥadīth and removed it from its plain sense so that it would accord with his own school. Thus he understood the Prophet’s phrase in it, “fa-l-yataḥarr” (let him seek out), to mean acting upon certainty, which for him was the lesser number. Yet any fair-minded reader will see—not merely doubt—the invalidity of that construction once he scrutinises the other versions of the report that I have cited, such as the wording, “fal-yanẓur alladhī yarā annahu al-ṣawāb” (let him look for what he believes to be correct). This is virtually explicit in requiring one to follow what predominates in his judgment. It is further supported by the Prophet’s statement in the ḥadīth of Abū Saʿīd: “fa-lam yadr kam ṣallā” (and he did not know how many rakʿahs he had prayed), for its implicit meaning is that whoever strives after the correct number until, after doubting, he comes to know how many he has prayed, is not to build on the lesser count. Rather, the ruling for that situation is left unspoken in this ḥadīth, and it is the ḥadīth of Ibn Masʿūd that clarifies it: the Prophet ﷺ there commanded taking what one thinks is nearer to correctness—be it the smaller or the larger number—and then, after the salām, performing two prostrations.

As for the state of genuine indecision, when one has no idea, he builds on the lesser number and prostrates before the salām. This points to the juristic distinction contained in the two ḥadīths; reflect on it well.

In any case, this question calls for extensive elaboration, analysis, and verification, but the present scope does not allow for that. What I have mentioned here will, I hope, suffice to demonstrate what I intended—namely, that whenever a preponderant probability exists, it is obligatory to act upon it. What you have just read is the essence of a separate treatise I authored on this topic, in which I refuted al-Nawawī in detail. There I clarified the meaning of the “doubt” mentioned in the ḥadīth of Abū Saʿīd and the meaning of “taḥarrī” (diligent searching) in the ḥadīth of Ibn Masʿūd, and I recorded benefits scarcely found elsewhere. Among them is the fact that the very narrator of the ḥadīth that instructs one to build on the lesser number—Abū Saʿīd, may Allah be pleased with him—himself issued legal verdicts to act upon taḥarrī and transmitted that from the Prophet ﷺ. I counted this among the many proofs of the correctness of the Ḥanafī position. Even so, I did not neglect to point out that their view declaring the prayer invalid when doubt occurs for the first time is itself invalid, and that the sound opinion is that such a person is included under the general ruling. These and other insights are what Allah, exalted be He, enabled me to produce; to Him belong all praise and grace.