He also said, “and the Sunnah of the rightly guided caliphs.”

The word “caliphs” (khulafāʾ) is the plural of khalīfa—those who succeeded the Prophet ﷺ in his community with respect to knowledge, practice, calling others to the faith, and governance. At their head stand the four rightly guided caliphs: Abū Bakr, ʿUmar, ʿUthmān, and ʿAlī—may Allah join us with them in the gardens of bliss. These four, together with every caliph who came after them and assumed the Prophet’s place of leadership in the ummah, are the ones whose Sunnah we have been commanded to follow. Still, it must be understood that the Sunnah of these caliphs is subordinate to the Sunnah of the Messenger ﷺ. If the practice of any caliph conflicts with the practice of Muḥammad ﷺ, the ruling belongs to the Prophet’s Sunnah, not to anything else, for the caliphs’ Sunnah is, in essence, an extension of his.

I mention this because two students of sacred knowledge once debated the number of rakʿahs in the nightly tarāwīḥ prayer. One argued that the Sunnah is twenty-three rakʿahs, while the other held that the Sunnah is thirteen—or, at most, eleven—rakʿahs. The first said to the second, “This is the Sunnah of the caliph ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb: twenty-three,” attempting thereby to set ʿUmar’s practice against that of the Prophet ﷺ. The other replied, “The Prophet’s Sunnah takes precedence—assuming, that is, the report from ʿUmar of twenty-three is even sound.” In fact, the most authentic chain concerning ʿUmar—recorded by Mālik in his Muwaṭṭaʾ—states that he ordered Tamīm al-Dārī and Ubayy ibn Kaʿb to lead the people in eleven rakʿahs, not twenty-three. That is what has been reliably transmitted from him, may Allah be pleased with him.

In any case, we can never set anyone’s practice, whether that of the caliphs or anyone else, in opposition to the Sunnah of the Messenger ﷺ. Whatever statement of a caliph contradicts the Prophet’s Sunnah must be excused and is not to be taken as evidence, nor may it be used to override the Sunnah.