The Excellence of Prostration
He ﷺ used to say, “There is no one from my community except that I shall recognize him on the Day of Resurrection.” They asked, “Messenger of Allah, how will you recognize them amid the multitude of creation?” He replied, “Tell me: if you entered a corral filled with uniformly coal-black horses and among them was a horse with a bright blaze and white fetlocks, would you not pick it out from the rest?” They said, “Indeed.” He said, “In the same way, my community on that day will have radiant faces from their prostration and gleaming limbs from their ablution.”

He also said, “When Allah wishes to show mercy to whomever He wills among the inhabitants of the Fire, He will command the angels to bring out those who used to worship Allah. The angels will recognize them by the marks of prostration and will remove them, for Allah has forbidden the Fire to consume the trace of prostration. Thus they will be brought out of the Fire; every part of the son of Adam will be consumed by it except the mark left by his prostrations.” ⦗774–779⦘

Prostrating on the Ground and on Mats
He would often prostrate directly on the bare earth. His Companions prayed with him in extreme heat; if one of them could not press his forehead to the ground, he would spread out his cloak and prostrate upon it. He ﷺ said, “…The whole earth has been made a place of prayer and a source of purification for me and for my community; wherever a man of my community is overtaken by the prayer, there lies his mosque and his purification. [Those before me venerated these matters; they prayed only in their churches and synagogues].”

At times he prostrated in mud and water. This occurred during the dawn prayer on the twenty-first night of Ramadan when rain fell and the roof of the mosque—made of palm branches—began to leak. He ﷺ prostrated in the water and mud. Abū Saʿīd al-Khuḍrī said, “My eyes beheld the Messenger of Allah ﷺ finish the prayer with traces of water and mud on his forehead and nose.”

He would occasionally pray upon a khumrah (a small palm-leaf mat), and at other times upon a straw mat; once he prayed on it after it had blackened from long use. ⦗780–797⦘

Rising from Prostration
Next, he ﷺ would raise his head from prostration while pronouncing the takbīr. He instructed the man who prayed incorrectly to do the same, saying, “No one’s prayer is complete until he prostrates, allowing his joints to settle, then says ‘Allāhu akbar’ and lifts his head until he is seated upright.” He would sometimes raise his hands with this takbīr. ⦗798–800⦘