This is the wording preserved by Muslim. As for the Prophet’s phrase “yanhazu,” it is pronounced with a fatḥa on its first and third letters and ends with a zay; it means “to drive him out and make him rise.”

Explanation:

When a person prays in the mosque with the congregation, that prayer is twenty-seven times superior to the one he performs in his house or in the marketplace, for praying in congregation fulfils what Allah has enjoined concerning communal worship.

The preponderant view among the scholars is that congregational prayer is an individual duty (farḍ ʿayn). Thus a Muslim is obliged to join the congregation in the mosque, as affirmed by numerous hadiths and by Allah’s subtle indication in His Book when He said, “When you are among them and lead them in prayer, let a party of them stand with you …” (al-Nisāʾ 4:102).

Allah therefore made congregational prayer obligatory even in a time of fear; if it is required under such conditions, it is all the more binding and appropriate in times of security.

The Prophet then explained the reason for this: “When a man performs ablution in his house, perfects it, and then leaves for the mosque, driven by nothing but the prayer—nothing impels him except the prayer—he does not take a single step without Allah raising him a rank by it and wiping away a sin by it.” Whether his home is near the mosque or far, every step secures two benefits:

1. Allah raises him one rank.