follow one another in an unbroken chain; so where, then, can this purported sunnah find a place? Al-Ḥāfiẓ al-ʿIrāqī points to the same conclusion, saying:

“No report indicates that the Prophet ﷺ used to pray before Friday prayer, for he would come out to the mosque, the call to prayer would be made in his presence, and then he would deliver the sermon.”¹

Some Ḥanafī scholars noticed this implication and therefore held that the obligation to proceed to the mosque and to refrain from trade on Friday begins with the first adhān that precedes the preacher’s ascent to the pulpit, declaring this to be the correct position in the school. Yet they were fully aware that such an adhān did not exist in the Prophet’s time—when the verse, “When the call is made for prayer on Friday, hasten to the remembrance of Allah and leave off trading” (Q 62:9), was revealed—and that the verse actually referred to the adhān given after the preacher mounts the minbar, as has already been explained. They knew all of this, since it is widely attested in the hadith sources; still, they went further and set aside the statement of their own scholar al-Ṭaḥāwī, who agreed with what the sunnah establishes, saying that the adhān which obliges one to cease