376 – Al-Sāʾib ibn Yazīd (may Allah be pleased with him) reported that Muʿāwiyah said to him: “When you have performed the Friday prayer, do not join it to another prayer until you have spoken or departed, for the Messenger of Allah ﷺ commanded us not to connect one prayer to another until we have spoken or left.” Related by Muslim (1).
Vocabulary of the ḥadīth
• “do not connect it” (fa-lā taṣil-hā): from the verb waṣala, “to join, attach.”
• “or you leave”: i.e., leave the mosque or the spot where you prayed.
Points derived from the ḥadīth
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It is disliked to attach a voluntary prayer—even a regular sunnah—to an obligatory prayer until one has stepped out and prays it at home, which is preferable, or at least separates the two with the prescribed post-prayer remembrances. The Lawgiver’s aim is to distinguish obligatory acts from supererogatory ones, and the various acts of worship from one another, lest the obligatory be confused with something else and, over time and through ignorance, additions find their way into the required duties.
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The wisdom in this—Allah knows best—is to keep acts of worship distinct. Thus the voluntary is set apart from the obligatory; for the same reason one is prohibited from fasting one or two days before Ramadan. Many comparable examples exist in the Sacred Law.
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The recommended practice is that whoever has prayed Jumuʿah should perform its sunnah—or sunnahs—in the mosque, as the Prophet ﷺ used to do. However, he should not attach the regular sunnah to it directly; rather, he should begin it only after some speech has intervened, such as the legislated post-prayer remembrances.