standing so long that ʿAbdullāh said, “I was on the verge of doing something bad.” They asked, “What was it that you had in mind, O Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān?” He replied, “I thought of sitting down and leaving him.”

He was a young man—indeed, younger than the Messenger ﷺ—yet he still could not keep up with the Prophet.

Now, were someone to ask, “In the night prayer, is it better to lengthen the standing recitation, or to lengthen the bowing and prostration?” we would answer: look to whatever most benefits your heart. A person may find himself more humble and present-minded in prostration, while another may, during the standing, recite and ponder the Qur’an and attain subtle insights from the Book of Allah that he would not gain in prostration. Nevertheless, the preferable course is to keep the elements of the prayer proportionate: if you lengthen the standing, lengthen the bowing and prostration; if you shorten the standing, shorten the bowing and prostration—so that the prayer remains balanced, like the prayer of the Prophet ﷺ. And Allah knows best.

1164 – Ibn Masʿūd (may Allah be pleased with him) related: A man who had slept through the night until morning was mentioned in the presence of the Prophet ﷺ. He said, “That is a man in whose ears Satan has urinated,” or he said, “in his ear.”