Section

As for the takbīr (saying “Allah is the Greatest”) during the prostrations of forgetfulness, the two Sahīh collections record in the hadith of Ibn Buhaynah:

“When he had completed his prayer, he performed two prostrations from his seated position before saying the salām, pronouncing the takbīr at each prostration. The people performed them with him to make up for the sitting he had forgotten.”

This concerns prostration before the salām. As for prostration after it, the hadith concerning Dhū al-Yadayn, narrated by Abū Hurayrah in the two Sahīh collections, states:

“He then prayed two units and said the salām. Then he pronounced the takbīr and prostrated, pronounced the takbīr and rose, pronounced the takbīr and prostrated, then pronounced the takbīr and rose.”

Pronouncing the takbīr is the position of the general body of scholars. However, they differed over the tashahhud (the seated testimony of faith) and the salām, holding three views:

It is reported from Anas, al-Hasan and ʿAtāʾ that these two prostrations involve neither a tashahhud nor a salām. Those who held this view likened them to the prostration of recitation: since they constitute a separate act of prostration, they involve neither a tashahhud nor a salām, just like the prostration of recitation. No one has transmitted from the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, that he said the salām in the prostration of recitation. Ahmad and others likewise stated this.

Ahmad said: “As for the salām, I do not know what its basis is.” The majority of the early generations held that there is no salām in it. Those who affirmed a salām in it did so by analogy, but this is a weak analogy, because it