on the basis of independent legal judgment or by following a scholarly authority. If he is correct, he receives two rewards; if he errs, he receives one. The follower also gives effect to a judge’s ruling in matters open to independent legal judgment, which is a weightier matter than following him in prayer. If the jurist’s ruling were invalid, it would not be permissible to give effect to what is invalid.

If the imam forgetfully omits ritual purification, the follower need not repeat the prayer according to the majority of scholars, as is established in reports from the Rightly Guided Caliphs. Yet the one who forgot must repeat his prayer, whereas one acting on an interpretive judgment need not. If prayer behind someone who must repeat his prayer is valid, then it is all the more valid behind someone who need not repeat it. The imam repeats the prayer when he remembers, but the follower does not. Neither the imam nor the follower has been negligent, for the imam would not abandon his conviction on the follower’s word.

This differs from a case in which the follower sees an impurity on the imam but does not alert him to it. Here the follower is negligent; if he prays, he must repeat the prayer because of his negligence. The imam, however, need not repeat it in this case, according to the sounder of the scholars’ two opinions. This is the position of Mālik, al-Shāfiʿī in his earlier view, and Ahmad according to the sounder of the two reports from him.

When the follower knows the imam’s circumstances in a case involving interpretive judgment, this means that he knows the imam is exercising independent legal judgment and that his error is forgiven. His prayer is therefore not invalid. This position is unquestionably correct. And Allah knows best.