that is well known:

“O Allah, punish the disbelievers among the People of the Book,” and so on.

This is the supplication that some people have made a sunnah practice in the qunūt of Ramadan. Yet this qunūt is not a regular sunnah, either in Ramadan or at any other time. Rather, ‘Umar offered qunūt because of the calamity that had befallen the Muslims, and his supplication in it suited that calamity. Likewise, when the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, first offered qunūt against the clans of Banū Sulaym who had killed the Quran reciters, he supplicated against them in terms suited to his purpose. Later, when he offered qunūt for the oppressed among his Companions, he made a supplication suited to that purpose.

The Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and his Rightly Guided Caliphs thus establishes two points:

First: the supplication of qunūt is prescribed when circumstances call for it; it is not a permanent sunnah practice in prayer.

Second: the supplication offered in it is not a fixed formula. Rather, on each occasion one offers a supplication appropriate to it, just as the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, did on the first and second occasions mentioned. So too did ‘Umar and ‘Alī, may Allah be pleased with them both. When the latter fought his opponents during the civil strife, he offered qunūt with a supplication suited to his purpose.

What makes this clear is that, had the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, regularly offered qunūt with a fixed supplication, the Muslims would have transmitted this from their Prophet. Such a matter would have given them every reason and incentive to transmit it. They are, after all, the very people who transmitted the supplications he offered in qunūt without maintaining them as a regular sunnah, such as his supplication against those who killed his Companions and his supplication for the oppressed among