The description of the night prayer, the number of its rak'ahs, and the amount of recitation
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
This is Umm Faisal. She sent this fax a little while ago, saying: Honorable Shaykh Salih, what is the description of the night prayer and the number of its rak'ahs? And is it required to lengthen the recitation to forty verses, as has been said?
Answer:
The number of rak'ahs for the night prayer is not fixed. Rather, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) encouraged standing in night prayer, but he did not specify a number of rak'ahs. However, if one increases the number of rak'ahs and the amount of night prayer, that is better. As for the recitation, it is also not fixed; recite whatever is easy for you of the Qur'an. One recites whatever is easy of the Qur'an. If he wishes to lengthen it, he lengthens it and increases the recitation, and if he wishes to lighten it, he has that option. Yes.
This is Umm Faisal. She sent this fax a little while ago, saying: Honorable Shaykh Salih, what is the description of the night prayer and the number of its rak'ahs? And is it required to lengthen the recitation to forty verses, as has been said?
Answer:
The number of rak'ahs for the night prayer is not fixed. Rather, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) encouraged standing in night prayer, but he did not specify a number of rak'ahs. However, if one increases the number of rak'ahs and the amount of night prayer, that is better. As for the recitation, it is also not fixed; recite whatever is easy for you of the Qur'an. One recites whatever is easy of the Qur'an. If he wishes to lengthen it, he lengthens it and increases the recitation, and if he wishes to lighten it, he has that option. Yes.
Source
قناة «مكة و المدينة»، 11 فتاوى على الهواء - 08 / 08 / 1433هـ _ الشيخ صالح الفوزان — youtube.com (23:46)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.