5 – The Fajr (Dawn) Prayer

1. Its earliest time begins the moment true dawn breaks, as mentioned earlier in the ḥadīth of Abū Hurayrah.
2. The Prophet ﷺ said, “The fajr is not the one that appears like this”—he brought the tips of his fingers together and pointed them downward toward the ground—“but the fajr is the one that appears like this,” and he placed one index finger upon the other and spread his hands. Muslim (3/129) and al-Bukhārī also record it; Muslim adds the wording: “spreading to the right and to the left.”
3. He ﷺ used to perform the fajr prayer while it was still dark (ghalas). Agreed upon, narrated from Jābir.
4. He delayed it until broad daylight (isfār) only once. In the report of Abū Masʿūd al-Anṣārī: “He once prayed the dawn in darkness and another time prayed it so that it had brightened; thereafter he always prayed it in darkness until he died and never again waited for the light.”
   This was transmitted by Abū Dāwūd (65), al-Ṭaḥāwī (104), al-Dāraqutnī (93) and Ibn Ḥibbān in his Ṣaḥīḥ, as cited in Naṣb al-Rāyah (240), through the chain of Usāmah ibn Zayd al-Laythī—who reported from Ibn Shihāb, from ʿUrwah—that he heard Bishr ibn Abī Masʿūd say: “I heard Abū Masʿūd relate it.” Al-Nawawī (3/52) judged the chain ḥasan, and al-Khaṭṭābī said: “Its isnād is sound.”
   As for the narration recorded by Aḥmad (2/135–136) through Abū Shuʿbah al-Ṭaḥḥān, the neighbor of al-Aʿmash, from Abū al-Rabīʿ, who said: “I was with Ibn ʿUmar… I told him: ‘I pray the dawn with you, then when I turn I cannot make out the face of the person next to me, though at times the sky has already brightened.’ He replied, ‘This is exactly how I saw the Messenger of Allah ﷺ pray, and I love to perform it as I saw the Messenger of Allah perform it.’”