228 – Abu Saʿīd al-Khudrī (may Allah be pleased with him) said: “We used to estimate the time the Messenger of Allah ﷺ stood during the Dhuhr and ʿAsr prayers. We found that his standing in the first two rakʿahs of Dhuhr was about as long as: Alif-Lām-Mīm. Tanzīl… (Sūrah al-Sajdah), while in the last two rakʿahs it was roughly half of that. In the first two rakʿahs of ʿAsr, his standing was the same length as the last two rakʿahs of Dhuhr, and in the last two rakʿahs it was again about half of that.” Narrated by Muslim (1).

Vocabulary of the hadith
• naḥzuru: with nūn fatḥah, hāʾ sukūn, and zāy ḍammah, from the pattern “naṣara”; it means “we surmise, estimate, or measure.” Al-Miṣbāḥ states: ḥaraztu al-shayʾa (“I estimated it”), and ḥazartu al-nakhl (“I assessed the date-palms”).

Points derived from the hadith
1 – The Prophet’s standing in the first two rakʿahs of Dhuhr equalled the length of Sūrah al-Sajdah; in the last two rakʿahs it was about half of that. In the first two rakʿahs of ʿAsr it matched the last two of Dhuhr, and in the final two of ʿAsr it was again half of that.

2 – His statement, “we reckoned his standing in the first two rakʿahs of Dhuhr to be about the length of ‘Alif-Lām-Mīm. Tanzīl…,’” suggests that the first and second rakʿahs of Dhuhr were equal in length, which appears to differ from the earlier report of Abu Qatādah. This can be reconciled in two ways: either the times and occasions differed, so the Prophet lengthened one rakʿah at some prayers and not at others, or the first rakʿah became longer because it included the opening supplication and the taʿawwudh (seeking refuge).

The preferable way to resolve the apparent divergence between the reports of Abu Qatādah and Abu