said to the man whom he taught to pray: “When you intend to pray, perform ablution thoroughly, then face the qibla, then proclaim Allah’s greatness, then recite, then bow until you are at rest in bowing”—and so the hadith continues. The unqualified term takbīr denotes only the wording Allāhu akbar (“Allah is the Greatest”).
Our argument by analogy against Abū Hanīfa is that this is a formula of remembrance lacking the wording of the takbīr, and therefore cannot serve to enter prayer, just as saying Allāhumma ighfir lī (“O Allah, forgive me”) cannot. Our argument by analogy against al-Shāfiʿī is that this adds to the wording of the takbīr ... beyond the form Allāhu akbar, and therefore cannot serve to enter prayer, just as saying Allāhu al-kabīr (“Allah is the Great”) cannot.
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The scholars differed over whether a valid entry into prayer requires the intention to coincide with the utterance—which, according to us, is the takbīr—or whether this is not a condition and the intention may precede it by a short interval. They agree that the intention may not precede the utterance by a long interval, nor may the utterance precede the intention by any interval, short or long. One view permits the intention to precede it by a short interval. Al-Shāfiʿī, however, held that it may not precede it by any interval, short or long. This was also the position of ʿAbd al-Wahhāb among our scholars, and it is the apparent meaning of Ibn Abī Zayd’s statement in his Risāla.
Entering prayer with the intention of performing the obligatory prayer is itself obligatory. There is no explicit statement on this from Mālik—may Allah Most High have mercy on him—or from any of his early companions. Had they regarded this as one of the obligatory elements of prayer, they would have discussed it rather than omitted its mention. Nor would they have excused anyone’s ignorance of it or permitted someone ignorant of it to lead the prayer, just as they do not permit someone to lead who is unaware that kissing and intimate physical contact invalidate ablution, or of similar matters on which they are unanimous and do not differ, despite the existence of disagreement over them.
In my judgment, the correct position according to his school and theirs is that the intention’s coinciding with the takbīr is not a condition for valid entry into prayer, and that it suffices for the intention to precede it by a short interval. Thus, if a man rises to pray but forgets to renew his intention at the very moment of entering prayer, his prayer is complete and valid, because his intention preceded his beginning the prayer. Someone who rises to pray cannot conceivably lack the intention to do so. This follows by analogy with their position on ritual bathing and ablution, and with the scholarly consensus concerning fasting, based on the text transmitted on this matter from the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him. Those who disagree on this have drawn a distinction between the two cases