Some of our Salafi brothers in various countries have been taken in by this remark of his, and for that reason it had to be flagged.

It is indeed surprising that such an explicit text should have escaped Ibn al-Qayyim—even though it is found in the Muwaṭṭaʾ, Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, and other primary sources we have cited. The surprise, however, fades once we remember that he wrote Zad al-Maʿad while travelling and far from his reference works; that, in fact, explains a number of other slips in the book, many of which I have documented in my annotations entitled al-Taʿliqāt al-Jiyād ʿalā Zad al-Maʿad.

What heightens the astonishment still more is that his own teacher, Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah, explicitly stated the opposite in some of his writings. How could this have been hidden from him, when no one knew Ibn Taymiyyah’s words better than he did? Shaykh al-Islam says in Majmūʿat al-Rasāʾil wa-al-Masāʾil (2/26–27), after citing the ḥadith:

“Combining the prayers falls into three levels.

1. If a person is on the move during the time of the first prayer and only halts in the time of the second, this is the combination established in the two Ṣaḥīḥs from the ḥadith of Anas and Ibn ʿUmar, and it parallels the combination at Muzdalifah.
2. If, during the time of the second prayer, he is still travelling or mounted and therefore combines in the time of the first, this is analogous to the combination at ʿArafah, and it is related in the Sunan—meaning this ḥadith of Muʿādh.
3. If he is encamped continuously during the times of both prayers, I know of nothing adduced for that except this ḥadith of Muʿādh. Its apparent sense is that he was staying in his tent while on the journey: he postponed ẓuhr, then came out and prayed ẓuhr and ʿaṣr together, returned indoors, then came out and prayed maghrib and ʿishāʾ together. ‘Entering’ and ‘coming out’ apply only to someone who is stationary; for a traveller in motion one would say ‘dismounted and mounted,’ not ‘entered and came out.’

Tabūk was the last expedition of the Prophet ﷺ; after that he travelled only for the Farewell Pilgrimage, and nothing has been transmitted …”