- Allowing anyone who has eaten garlic—or any other pungent herb or malodorous plant—to approach is forbidden so long as the offensive smell remains. The Prophet ﷺ declared during the expedition of Khaybar:
“Whoever eats from this foul-smelling tree”—on the first day he specified “garlic,” then he said, “garlic, onions, and leeks”—“let him not come near our mosque.”
• In another wording: “our mosques.”
• In a second report: “let him not come near us or pray with us.”
• A third version adds: “for three days [and let him stay in his house].”
• A fourth: “until its odor leaves him.”
• A fifth: “and let him not offend us with the smell of garlic.”
• A sixth narration states: “If you must eat them, then kill their smell by cooking them,” meaning onions and garlic.
“For the angels are offended by whatever offends human beings.”
This ḥadīth comes from several Companions, related through many chains with variant wordings, each complementing the others.
First: Jābir ibn ʿAbd Allāh.
He is the source of several routes:
- Kathīr ibn Hishām → Hishām al-Dastawāʾī → Abū al-Zubayr → Jābir (this is the principal wording). Muslim and Aḥmad recorded it. Al-Ṭabarānī also narrated it in al-Ṣaghīr through the route of Yaḥyā ibn Rāshid al-Barrāʾ, who said: “Hishām ibn Ḥassān al-Firdawsī related to us, from Abū al-Zubayr, from Jābir,” adding the words: “garlic, onions, leeks, and radishes,” and remarking, “No one relates it from Hishām al-Firdawsī except Yaḥyā ibn Rāshid.”