What the Prophet ﷺ Used to Recite in the Prayers
With regard to the sūrahs and verses he ﷺ recited during the prayers, they differed according to the five daily prayers and other kinds of prayer. Below is a detailed account, beginning with the first of the five:
- The Dawn Prayer (Fajr)
– He ﷺ most often recited from the long passages of the mufassal. Thus, at times he would recite Sūrah al-Wāqiʿah (56:96) and similar sūrahs in both rakʿahs. On the Farewell Pilgrimage he recited from Sūrah al-Ṭūr (52:49). On other occasions he opened with Sūrah Qāf—“By the Glorious Qur’an” (50:45)—and the like in the first rakʿah.
– Sometimes he chose from the short mufassal, such as “When the sun is folded up” (81:29). Once he recited “When the earth is shaken” (99:8) in both rakʿahs, whereupon the narrator remarked, “I do not know whether the Messenger of Allah ﷺ forgot or meant to do that.” While travelling he once recited the two protecting sūrahs: “Say: I seek refuge with the Lord of daybreak” (113:5) and “Say: I seek refuge with the Lord of mankind” (114:6). He said to ʿUqbah ibn ʿĀmir (Allah be pleased with him), “Recite the two protecting sūrahs in your prayer, for no one seeking refuge has ever sought with anything better than the two of them.”
– At other times his recitation was longer still, reaching sixty verses or more; one of the reporters said, “I am not sure whether that was in a single rakʿah or in both.” He also recited Sūrah al-Rūm (30:60) and, on occasion, Sūrah Yā-Sīn (36:83). Once, leading the dawn prayer in Mecca, he began Sūrah al-Muʾminūn (23:118); when he reached the passage about Moses and Aaron—or, according to some narrators, about Jesus—he was overtaken by a cough and bowed. At other times he led them with Sūrah al-Ṣāffāt (37:182).
– On Fridays he recited Alif-Lām-Mīm. “The Revelation…”—that is, Sūrah al-Sajdah (32:30)—in the first rakʿah, and “Has there not come over man…,” that is, Sūrah al-Insān (76:31), in the second.
– He would lengthen the first rakʿah and shorten the second. (p. 429–447)
Recitation in the Sunnah of Fajr
As for his recitation in the two Sunnah rakʿahs before Fajr, it was extremely light, so much so that ʿĀʾishah (Allah be pleased with her) used to say, “Did he even recite the Mother of the Book (al-Fātiḥah) in them?” On occasion, after al-Fātiḥah, he would recite in the first of the two the verse, “Say: We believe in Allah and in what has been sent down to us and what was sent down to Abraham….”