the opening takbīr coincide exactly with the very first moment of the prescribed time; yet this view is irregular, and the present ḥadīth demonstrates the opposite.
- When the muʾadhdhin starts to pronounce the iqāmah, no one is to begin any supererogatory prayer—even the two-rakʿah Sunnah of Fajr. Rather, he must join the obligatory prayer that is being established, for the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: “Once the iqāmah for a prayer is pronounced, there is no prayer except the one for which the iqāmah was called.”
This ḥadīth is narrated from Abū Hurayrah.
Imām Aḥmad recorded it in these very words through the chain: Ḥasan → Ibn Lahīʿa → ʿIyāsh ibn ʿAbbās al-Qutbānī → Abū Tamīm al-Zuhrī → Abū Hurayrah.
The chain is sound. All its transmitters are found in Muslim’s Ṣaḥīḥ except Ibn Lahīʿa; he is reliable, though his memory is sometimes faulty, and in this instance he has supporting narration, which shows that he preserved it accurately.
Al-Ṭaḥāwī also related the ḥadīth, saying: “Fahd told us; Abū Ṣāliḥ told us; al-Layth narrated to me from ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿIyāsh ibn ʿAbbās al-Qutbānī, from his father, from Abū Salamah, from Abū Hurayrah”—with the same wording.
This chain likewise is sound; its narrators are those of the two Ṣaḥīḥs except for this Fahd—Fahd ibn Sulaymān ibn Yaḥyā. Ibn Yūnus said of him, “He was trustworthy and firm.” Rashīd Allāh Shāh al-Sindhī mentioned him in Kashf al-Astār ʿan Rijāl Maʿānī al-Āthār.
A discrepancy remains concerning ʿIyāsh ibn ʿAbbās: Ibn Lahīʿa transmits from him via Abū Tamīm, whereas his son ʿAbd Allāh transmits from him via Abū Salamah. The latter version is probably the more accurate, for ʿAbd Allāh was the more precise of the two.