the prayer, whether in supplications he makes for himself while prostrating, while sitting between the two prostrations, or at the end of the prayer before the salutation.

Ibn al-Qayyim—may Allah have mercy on him—said: “All of his supplications that have been reliably transmitted are worded in the singular, such as: ‘My Lord, forgive me, have mercy on me, and guide me,’1 and the rest of the supplications transmitted from him. Among them are his words in the opening supplication: ‘O Allah, wash away my sins with snow, water, and hail. O Allah, distance me from my sins as You have distanced the East from the West,’ and so forth in the hadith.2 Imam Ahmad and the compilers of the Sunan collections narrated from Thawbān that the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—said: ‘No servant should lead a people in prayer and then single himself out, to their exclusion, in a supplication. If he does so, he has betrayed them.’3 …” Ibn al-Qayyim—may Allah have mercy on him—then said: “I heard Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah say: ‘In my view, this hadith applies to a supplication the imam makes for himself and the congregation, in which they all participate, such as the qunūt supplication and the like.’”4

Furthermore, if the supplication he makes during his prayer is one of the supplications found in the Quran, he uses the form in which it appears in the Quran, as in the words of Allah Most High: “Guide us to the Straight Path.” This is a tremendous supplication that a Muslim makes in his prayer—indeed, in every unit of the prayer—and the reason for using the form