• We do not brand as an innovator or regard as misguided anyone who performs more than this number of rakʿahs, provided the Sunnah has not yet become clear to him and he is not acting out of personal caprice.

• Even if someone maintains that adding to it is permissible, there is no doubt that the better course is to stop at the prophetic limit, for the Messenger ﷺ said, “The best guidance is the guidance of Muhammad.”

• ʿUmar—may Allah be pleased with him—introduced nothing new into the tarāwīḥ prayer; he merely revived the Sunnah of performing it in congregation and kept to the legislated count. None of the reports claiming that he raised it to twenty rakʿahs is sound: their chains are of the sort that do not corroborate one another. This weakness was noted by al-Shāfiʿī and al-Tirmidhī and was further affirmed by al-Nawawī, al-Zaylaʿī, and others.

• Even were that alleged increase authentic, it would not be obligatory today, for it was tied to a circumstance that no longer exists. Insisting on it has generally led its adherents to rush through the prayer, stripping it of humility and, at times, even of validity.

• Our refusal to adopt the increase is comparable to the way judges in the sharʿī courts do not uphold ʿUmar’s opinion that a triple divorce pronounced at once counts as three. There is no difference—indeed our position is even stronger, even from the standpoint of those who follow legal authority. ⦗123⦘