The fourth report is Jābir’s ḥadīth from the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—in which he said:

“Whoever has an imām, the imām’s recitation suffices for his recitation.”

A fifth ḥadīth on the same subject, judged sound by Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, states that the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—said:

“When the imām recites, keep silent.”

The scholars disagreed over how to harmonize these texts. Some, guided by the ḥadīth of ʿUbādah ibn al-Ṣāmit, exempted only Sūrat al-Fātiḥah from the prohibition on reciting while the imām is reciting aloud. Others, citing the Prophet’s saying, “There is no prayer without Sūrat al-Fātiḥah,” excluded the follower in the audible prayers from that general rule, arguing from the prohibition reported by Abū Hurayrah against reciting during the imām’s audible recitation, and reinforcing their stance with the plain sense of the Qur’ānic verse:

“When the Qur’an is recited, listen to it and remain silent so that you may receive mercy” (al-Aʿrāf 7:204),

a verse they maintained was revealed concerning the prayer.

A third group exempted the follower altogether from the obligatory recitation—whether the prayer be silent or audible—and confined the obligation to the imām and the lone worshipper, basing this on Jābir’s ḥadīth. This is the position of Abū Ḥanīfah, who thus regards Jābir’s ḥadīth as qualifying the Prophet’s statement, “Recite whatever is easy for you,” for he does not consider Sūrat al-Fātiḥah itself obligatory but sees the duty as a general requirement to recite, as explained earlier.

The ḥadīth of Jābir, however, is not transmitted in a marfūʿ form except through Jābir al-Juʿfī, and anything he alone relates is not accepted as proof. Abū ʿUmar said: This ḥadīth is only deemed sound—if sound at all—when transmitted as a marfūʿ report on the authority of Jābir.