and asked him, “What was it you told me about ʿĀ’ishah?” He then repeated what he had told me. ʿUmar said, “Did you not tell me that she used to pray four rakʿahs when travelling?” He replied, “Yes.”’”
In the two Sahīh collections, Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah narrates from al-Zuhrī, from ʿUrwah, from ʿĀ’ishah, who said:
“When prayer was first prescribed, it consisted of two rakʿahs for each prayer. Prayer when resident was then increased, while prayer during travel was left unchanged.”
Al-Zuhrī said: “I asked, ‘Why, then, did ʿĀ’ishah pray the full prayer?’ He replied, ‘She acted on her own interpretation, as ʿUthmān did.’”
Thus, ʿUrwah reports that she justified praying the full prayer by saying, “It causes me no hardship,” and he states that she acted on her own interpretation, as ʿUthmān did. This shows that her practice of praying the full prayer rested on an interpretation arising from her own legal reasoning. Had the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, approved her praying the full prayer, or had he himself prayed it in full, she would have been following the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him. The same would apply to ʿUthmān. It would not have been a matter of interpretation based on independent legal reasoning.
Now, this hadith is the strongest hadith evidence relied upon by those who advocate praying the full prayer when travelling, yet it has been shown to be false. What, then, of the still more unfounded claim that the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, would sometimes pray the full prayer when travelling and sometimes shorten it? This contradicts what is established through mass transmission concerning his Sunnah, which his Companions unanimously transmitted from him and conveyed to his community. Not a single Companion ever reported that he prayed four rakʿahs when travelling. Rather, reports from them have reached the level of mass transmission that he and his Companions used to pray two rakʿahs when travelling.
As for the report narrated by Zayd al-ʿAmmī from Anas ibn Mālik, who said, “We