twice while seated.” Then the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, turned and performed two prostrations.

Al-Bukhārī reports from Ibn Mas'ūd:

“The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, prayed five units for the noon prayer, then performed two prostrations after giving the salām.”

In the two Sahīh collections, Ibn Mas'ūd reports:

“The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, performed the two prostrations for forgetfulness after giving the salām and speaking.”

This is the case concerning which Ahmad’s rulings differed: should one prostrate after the salām, as the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, did, or before it if one remembers before giving the salām? The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, only prostrated after the salām because he did not remember until he had given it and they reminded him.

According to one of the two reports of Ahmad’s position, prostration after the salām is not restricted to the particular case addressed by the text, as the majority—including Abū Hanīfah, Mālik, and others—have maintained. Likewise, prostration before the salām is not restricted to the particular case addressed by the text, as the majority—Abū Hanīfah, Mālik, and others—have maintained. Rather, the correct view is that some prostrations are performed before the salām and others after it, as established by the authentic hadiths.

Anyone who holds that all such prostrations are performed before the salām, citing al-Zuhrī’s report that “the later of the two practices was prostration before the salām,” has claimed abrogation. This is a weak claim. For, concerning prostration after the salām in the hadith of Dhū al-Yadayn, Mālik, al-Shāfi'ī, and the majority