[Chapter on Prayer]
[Chapter on the Times of Prayer]
Chapter

When they begin their treatment of prayer with its prescribed times, the hadith jurists apply in this area all the texts transmitted from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) concerning the permissible and preferred times.

The time for Fajr extends from the break of true dawn until sunrise. The time for Dhuhr extends from the sun’s passing the meridian until the shadow of every object equals its height, excluding the noonday shadow. The time for Asr extends until the sun begins to yellow, according to the apparent position of Ahmad’s school. The time for Maghrib extends until the twilight disappears, and the time for Isha extends until the midpoint of the night, according to the apparent position of Ahmad’s school.

This is precisely what the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) stated in the hadith that Muslim narrated in his Sahīh from Abdullāh ibn Amr. It has also been narrated in a hadith from Abū Hurayra (may Allah be pleased with him). No statement of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) concerning the five prayer times is more authentic than this. Its meaning has likewise been authentically established through multiple routes in accounts of the Prophet’s practice in Medina, in the hadiths of Abū Mūsā and Burayda (may Allah be pleased with them). Its individual elements also occur separately in several hadiths, and most jurists have applied most of this.

The well-known position of the scholars of Iraq is that the time for Asr does not begin until the shadow of every object is twice its height. As for the scholars of the Hijaz—Mālik and others—they hold that Maghrib has only one time.