Moreover, when something characterizes the community because it is more beneficial than its alternatives, and because those alternatives involve harm, it must be maintained and may not be replaced by something else, for two reasons: the harm involved in the alternative, and the obligation to preserve the community’s quality of excellence. Even if an individual is not personally obliged to perform recommended acts, everything prescribed for the community as a whole becomes part of its religion. Preserving the religion in its entirety is obligatory upon the community, whether as an individual or a collective obligation. Thus, the community as a whole must preserve the entire Book and all the Sunnah teachings concerning recommended and encouraged acts, even though this is not obligatory upon each of its members. Likewise, the community is required to uphold generally recommended practices that individuals are not required to observe for themselves.

For example, someone who leads people in prayer may not habitually do everything that a person praying alone is permitted to do. Rather, he must neither prolong the prayer so much that it causes hardship to those behind him, nor fall short of its established Sunnah practices, such as reciting a surah in each of the first two units, completing the bowing and prostration, and similar matters. Indeed, the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, instructed the Companions to remove an imam from leading the prayer because he had spat in the direction of the mosque’s qiblah. He also said:

“The people should be led in prayer by the one most proficient in reciting the Book of Allah. If they are equal in recitation, then by the one most knowledgeable about the Sunnah. If they are equal in their knowledge of the Sunnah…”—and the hadith continues.

He also said:

“When a man leads people in prayer while someone better than him is among them, they will remain in decline.”

For this reason, the jurists state that the imam who leads the people in their Hajj must ensure