185 – From Abu Dharr al-Ghifārī (may Allah be pleased with him): the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said, “A man’s prayer is broken by: a woman, a donkey, and a black dog …” The narration also contains the phrase, “The black dog is a devil.” Recorded by Muslim.⦗1⦘

Muslim likewise reports, on the authority of Abu Hurayrah, a similar ḥadith that omits the mention of the dog.⦗2⦘ Abu Dāwūd and al-Nasāʾī transmit from Ibn ʿAbbās a parallel wording that stops earlier and specifies “a menstruating woman.”⦗3⦘

Status of the ḥadith:
The tradition is sound in its essence, yet the compiler’s claim that Muslim’s report from Abu Hurayrah omits the dog is an oversight, for Muslim’s text actually reads: “What breaks the prayer is a woman, a donkey, and a dog.” As for limiting the ruling to a menstruating woman, the majority of ḥadith scholars judge that wording to be mawqūf—attributed solely to Ibn ʿAbbās—and not authentically traced back to the Prophet.

Vocabulary:
– “Breaks the prayer”: invalidates it.
– “Donkey”: a domesticated equine used for carrying loads and riding; the female is ḥimārah. Its plurals are ḥumur and ḥamīr, and the plural of ḥimārah is ḥamāʾir.
– “Dog”: any predatory canine—though the term has come to denote the barking dog specifically, becoming its primary linguistic sense. Plurals: kulub and kilāb; the female is kalbah, plural kalbāt.
– “Woman”: the grammatical subject of “breaks,” i.e., the passing of a woman, and so on.