and Abū Ḥanīfah chose to give precedence to the ḥadīth of Wāʾil.
Al-Shāfiʿī adopted the method of reconciling the reports in light of Abū Ḥumayd’s ḥadīth, whereas al-Ṭabarī took the view of allowing a choice. He said: “All of these postures are permissible, and it is commendable to perform any of them, because each is authentically transmitted from the Messenger of Allah—peace and blessings be upon him.” This is a sound position, for when various actions are reported it is preferable to regard them as alternatives rather than as conflicting. Actual contradiction is more readily conceived when an action is weighed against a statement, or one statement against another.

The fourth issue: scholars have differed over the middle sitting and the final sitting. The majority hold that the middle sitting is Sunnah, not obligatory, while a minority have declared it obligatory. Conversely, the majority maintain that the final sitting is obligatory, and a small group dissented, saying that it is not.

The cause of their disagreement lies in the apparent conflict of the ḥadīths’ implications and in drawing an analogy between the two sittings. In the previously cited ḥadīth of Abū Hurayrah—“Sit until you are at ease sitting”—the outward sense makes sitting obligatory throughout the prayer; thus, whoever follows this ḥadīth says that every sitting is compulsory. Yet in the sound ḥadīth of Ibn Buḥaynah it is related that the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—omitted the middle sitting, did not make it up, and performed the prostration of forgetfulness for it. It is also authentically reported that he once omitted two rakʿahs and compensated for them, and likewise one rakʿah. From this difference the jurists understood that the ruling of the middle sitting is not the same as that of a rakʿah, for the rakʿah is, by consensus, an obligation; therefore the middle sitting cannot be obligatory. This is what led the jurists to distinguish between the two sittings and to hold that the prostration of forgetfulness is prescribed for omitted Sunnahs, not for omitted obligations.

Those who consider the middle sitting obligatory respond that the prostration performed for it is a ruling peculiar to that sitting and does not prove that it is not obligatory. On the other hand, those who judge both sittings to be Sunnah have analogized the final sitting to the middle one, having first concluded—on the same evidence relied upon by the majority—that the middle sitting is Sunnah.

Thus the real root of their disagreement returns to weighing the evidence presented by the outward wording or the outward action; for there are also some who hold both sittings to be obligatory on the grounds that the Prophet’s actions—peace