The reply to them is:

Fasting during menstruation, and praying without ritual purification or facing a direction other than the qiblah, are likewise acts of a prescribed kind. The prohibition concerns only a particular attribute: menstruation, ritual impurity, or facing a direction other than the qiblah. No intelligible distinction lacking any bearing on Islamic law is known between these cases.

If it is said that menstruation and ritual impurity are attributes of the menstruating woman and the person in a state of ritual impurity, whereas the other attribute pertains to the time, the reply is: An attribute of the circumstances in which an act takes place—its time and place—is like an attribute of the person performing it. If someone were to stand at ʿArafah outside its appointed time, or somewhere other than ʿArafah, that would not be valid, although the attribute here pertains to time and place. The same applies if someone were to stone the pillars outside the days of Minā or at somewhere other than the designated location: the attribute pertains to time and place. Facing a direction other than the qiblah concerns an attribute of the direction, not of the person, yet it is not permissible. Likewise, fasting at night would not be valid, even though this concerns time.

If it is said that night is not a legally prescribed time for fasting, the reply is: Neither is the day of Eid a legally prescribed time for fasting, just as the period of menstruation is not a legally prescribed time for fasting. The distinction must therefore be one recognized by Islamic law: it must be intelligible, and the Lawgiver must have made it operative in determining the ruling, making it the basis for the permissibility or prohibition that applies specifically to one of the two acts.

Many people invoke distinctions that have no reality and no bearing on Islamic law, or deny that an attribute has any effect on the ruling in the original case. A person may cite an attribute as the common ground between the original case and the case being compared with it, although that attribute is not shared by them; rather,