Rulings for the traveler residing at the university
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question : Your Eminence the Shaykh! We heard you say that a student who studies at the university and lives in Riyadh, if Wednesday comes he leaves, and when Friday comes he leaves, and when the vacation comes he goes directly to his family, knowing that he has a rented apartment here, and that he takes the rulings of a traveler. Is this correct? And what are the rulings he takes? May Allah reward you with good. Knowing that I am ninety kilometers away from Riyadh, am I considered a traveler?
Answer : Yes, I said this and I say it, and travel has no limit, as long as the person is away from his homeland.
And he intends to return to it when his need is finished, then he is a traveler, whether he specified the duration or not, and there is no evidence that distinguishes between the one who specified the duration and the one who did not. They are all away from their homelands, they are all waiting for the need for which they traveled, and when it is finished they return to their lands. I say this, and it is the choice of Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah (may Allah have mercy on him), and our Shaykh 'Abd al-Rahman al-Sa'di, and the apparent choice of Ibn al-Qayyim (may Allah have mercy on him) in *Zad al-Ma'ad*, and of precise scholars. Up to this moment, I have not found in the Qur'an or the Sunnah a specified distance by which travel is ended. The default is that travel remains until the person returns to it, but regarding fasting, I see that he should not leave fasting if Ramadan passes while he is at the university. I see that he should fast, because if he leaves fasting,
the days may accumulate for him, and he may be unable to keep up with them, and it may become difficult for him to make them up. As for the prayer, he will pray it in its time, but it is shortened. And it is known to you that if a person becomes a ma'mum (one praying behind the imam) and his imam completes the prayer, it is obligatory for him to complete the prayer, whether he caught the prayer from its beginning or from its end.
Answer : Yes, I said this and I say it, and travel has no limit, as long as the person is away from his homeland.
And he intends to return to it when his need is finished, then he is a traveler, whether he specified the duration or not, and there is no evidence that distinguishes between the one who specified the duration and the one who did not. They are all away from their homelands, they are all waiting for the need for which they traveled, and when it is finished they return to their lands. I say this, and it is the choice of Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah (may Allah have mercy on him), and our Shaykh 'Abd al-Rahman al-Sa'di, and the apparent choice of Ibn al-Qayyim (may Allah have mercy on him) in *Zad al-Ma'ad*, and of precise scholars. Up to this moment, I have not found in the Qur'an or the Sunnah a specified distance by which travel is ended. The default is that travel remains until the person returns to it, but regarding fasting, I see that he should not leave fasting if Ramadan passes while he is at the university. I see that he should fast, because if he leaves fasting,
the days may accumulate for him, and he may be unable to keep up with them, and it may become difficult for him to make them up. As for the prayer, he will pray it in its time, but it is shortened. And it is known to you that if a person becomes a ma'mum (one praying behind the imam) and his imam completes the prayer, it is obligatory for him to complete the prayer, whether he caught the prayer from its beginning or from its end.
Source
لقاء مع طلاب جامعة الإمام بمسجد الإسكان — archive.org (3:49)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.