supplication for worldly benefits is permissible, since it is prescribed, whereas supplication concerning certain religious matters may constitute transgression, as has been related from the Companions, and as when someone asks for the stations of the prophets.

A better formulation would therefore be: “except with prescribed supplication established by the Sunnah,” meaning what has been transmitted in the reports and whatever conveys the same meaning, since, unlike the Quran, we are not required to worship using its exact wording.

We have prohibited reciting the Quran in translation because its wording is itself intended. The same applies to the declaration of Allah’s greatness and similar forms of remembrance. As for supplication, however, no fixed wording has been prescribed, although Ahmad disliked offering it in a language other than Arabic.

There are thus three levels: recitation, remembrance, and supplication using the transmitted wording; then using Arabic wording that conveys the same meaning; then using wording in another language. Ahmad disliked this last practice in prayer, and there is disagreement over whether it invalidates the prayer. It is a form of substitution.

The proponents of juristic reasoning permit translation into a non-Arabic language, despite their strict prohibition of ordinary speech during prayer—to the point that they disapproved of supplication not found in the Quran or in transmitted reports and held that it invalidated the prayer. Thus, they did not regard the use of Arabic as an act of worship in itself, and they permitted the declaration of Allah’s greatness using any wording that conveys magnification. They therefore allowed considerable latitude in substituting a non-Arabic rendering for the Quran and in replacing one form of remembrance with another, but did not allow comparable latitude in supplication. Ahmad and other leading scholars, however,