113 – Ibn ʿAbbās (may Allah be pleased with him) explained the verse, “And if you are ill or on a journey” (al-Māʾidah 5:6), saying: “When a man has wounds or sores sustained in the cause of Allah and then enters a state of major ritual impurity, and he fears that he would die were he to wash himself, he may perform tayammum.” Al-Dāraqutnī recorded the report as mawqūf, al-Bazzār transmitted it as marfūʿ, and Ibn Khuzaymah and al-Ḥākim declared it authentic.⦗1⦘

Grade of the ḥadīth:
The report is mawqūf. Al-Ḥāfiẓ [Ibn Ḥajar] said in al-Talkhīṣ: “The correct view is that it is mawqūf.” I say: the sound position is that it carries the force of a marfūʿ report, for this is a matter that leaves no room for personal opinion or independent reasoning. Al-Bazzār said: “We know of no reliable narrator who related it as marfūʿ from ʿAṭāʾ except Jarīr ibn Ḥāzim.” Aḥmad, Ibn Maʿīn, and al-ʿUqaylī stated that Jarīr heard from ʿAṭāʾ after the latter’s memory had become confused; therefore the marfūʿ version is not sound.

Vocabulary:
– al-jarāḥah (wound): a cut or laceration in the body; plural jurūḥ, and the plural of jarīḥ (one who is wounded) is jarḥā.
– marḍā (ill): plural of marīḍ. Al-Qurṭubī said: “Illness is the body’s departure from its normal equilibrium.” Here it refers to an illness in which one fears harm from using water.
– “or on a journey”: the particle aw is a coordinating conjunction. The prepositional phrase ʿalā safar is linked to an omitted word and coordinated with the predicate marḍā in the expression kun-tum marḍā.
– al-qurūḥ (sores): plural of qurḥ; wounds and fissures caused by weapons or by disease.