Others went further, making it obligatory in those two points of the prayer as well as at prostration, each opinion reflecting its proponent’s view on the positions in which the hands are to be lifted.

The root of their disagreement is the apparent tension between the ḥadīth of Abū Hurayrah that sets out the obligatory elements of the prayer and the Prophet’s own practice—peace and blessings be upon him. In the report of Abū Hurayrah the Prophet simply told the man, “Pronounce the takbīr,” without instructing him to raise his hands, whereas sound reports from Ibn ʿUmar and others state that “he used to raise his hands when he opened the prayer.”

As for the specific points at which the hands are to be raised: the scholars of Kūfah—Abū Ḥanīfah, Sufyān al-Thawrī, and the rest of their jurists—maintain that the worshipper raises his hands only at the opening takbīrah. This is also one narration from Mālik, related by Ibn al-Qāsim. Al-Shāfiʿī, Aḥmad, Abū ʿUbayd, Abū Thawr, the overwhelming majority of ḥadīth scholars, and the Ẓāhirīs, however, hold that the hands are raised at three junctures: the opening takbīrah, the bowing, and when rising from the bow. This position is likewise reported from Mālik, though some of those scholars deem it obligatory while Mālik himself regards it as Sunnah. A group of ḥadīth scholars went further still, recommending that the hands be raised at the prostration and on rising from it.

The underlying cause of all these divergences is the variety of transmitted reports on the matter, compounded by the fact that actual practice in Madinah conflicted with some of those reports. The narrations include, for example:

1. The ḥadīth of ʿAbd Allāh ibn Masʿūd and the ḥadīth of al-Barāʾ ibn ʿĀzib, both stating that the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—raised his hands only once, at the opening takbīrah, and no more.

2. The ḥadīth of Ibn ʿUmar, related from his father, in which he says: “When the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—opened the prayer he would raise his hands level with his shoulders; when he lifted his head from bowing he would raise them in the same way and say, ‘Allah hears whoever praises Him; our Lord, to You belongs all praise.’ He did not do so in prostration.” This ḥadīth is agreed upon as sound, and it is claimed that no fewer than thirteen Companions transmitted it from the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace.