Hurayrah reciting the invocation for refuge aloud, and Ibn ʿAbbās reciting aloud during the funeral prayer so that people would know that it is Sunnah. It may be said that those Companions who recited the basmalah aloud did so for this reason: to make it known that reciting it is Sunnah, not because reciting it aloud is Sunnah.

Anyone who reflects on the established reports on this subject as a whole will recognize that it is a verse from the Book of Allah, and that they recited it to demonstrate this—not to demonstrate that it forms part of al-Fātihah or that reciting it aloud is Sunnah. An example is what Ibn Wahb mentioned in his Jāmiʿ:

“Men of learning informed me on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, Abū Hurayrah and Zayd ibn Aslam; Ibn Shihāb related the same through a different report from Ibn ʿUmar: he used to begin his recitation with ‘In the name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful.’”

Ibn Shihāb said: “His intention was to show that it is a verse of the Quran, for Allah revealed it.” He added: “The scholars of jurisprudence used to do this in earlier times.”

The report from Ibn ʿUmar is well known through the narration of Hammād ibn Zayd, from Ayyūb, from Nāfiʿ, from Ibn ʿUmar: when he prayed, he would recite aloud, “In the name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful.” Then, after saying:

“Not of those who have incurred Your anger, nor of those who have gone astray,”

he would say: “In the name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful.”

This explanation given by Ibn Shihāb al-Zuhrī—the most knowledgeable person of his time concerning the Sunnah—clarifies the actual situation. For the principal reports concerning its recitation are those transmitted from Ibn ʿAbbās, Abū Hurayrah and Ibn ʿUmar. He knew the true nature of Abū Hurayrah’s practice in this matter, and likewise that of the others—may Allah be pleased with them all.