What is the ruling if two men arrive and catch one or two rak'ahs of the prayer, then pray in congregation after the imam has said the taslim?

The questioner : The Shaykh :

The Shaykh: Yes.

The questioner : Two men arrived and caught one or two rak'ahs of the prayer. Is it permissible for them to pray in congregation after the imam has said the taslim?

The Shaykh : No, there is no second congregation after the first congregation, absolutely, whether in this case or in the other cases that occur these days in all the mosques of the world, and unfortunately, Islam is keen on the unity of the ranks and not splitting the congregation. Therefore, it encourages Muslims to maintain the first congregation and does not permit them a second congregation, because it comes at the expense of the first congregation, even if these people are excused. We know that the Sunnah clarifies this, as it came in Sunan al-Nasa'i from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) that he said: , and perhaps he added: . So, the one who comes wanting to pray the second congregation is either excused or not excused. If he is excused, it is that he went out intending to pray with the first congregation but was surprised to find that they had finished, so he is written the reward of their prayer. Or he is not excused, and how can he be written the like of the reward of their prayer? Rather, if he forms a congregation, he has only formed a congregation that splits the ranks of the Muslims. Then this second congregation becomes the habit of people, such that this congregation stamps them with the stamp of laziness regarding the first congregation and reliance on the second and third. I know this personally about myself, let alone others. When I was seeking knowledge, I was practicing the profession of repairing watches at that time, and the shop where I worked was close to the mosque; there was only about fifty meters between me and the mosque. So I would hear the adhan and I tell you the situation that occurred: I would hear the adhan while I was repairing a watch, for example, installing a hand or installing a crystal, and this does not take much time. It is supposed that as soon as I hear the adhan, I must respond to the call of Allah. I would hesitate and say, "Until I finish installing this hand, and this will not take the time that would keep me from the congregational prayer, until I install this crystal..." and then I would find that the congregational prayer had passed me. I would say, "No harm, you may enter the mosque and the congregation has ended, and you will find a person leading you in a second congregation." Perhaps you will not find one. But you are a student of knowledge, you are leading people, you mean, you are not pleased with yourself. And so I continued, and Allah willing, because I did not have the idea that I had learned from the books of the madhhab that the second congregation is disliked. Knowing that the books of the Hanafi madhhab explicitly state in the matn, but the marginal notes corrupt the matn, so it was said, "Whoever includes the marginal notes includes nothing." In the matn, I later became aware of this: "It is disliked to repeat the congregation in a mosque that has a regular imam." ... Regular. The matn of the Hanafis is on this.

The questioner : ... ... .

The Shaykh : Keep what you have. The important thing is that I continued on this, and Allah willing, until Allah taught me what I did not know, and I knew that the righteous Salaf did not have a second congregation like this at all. And I looked at the explicit statement of Imam al-Shafi'i on the subject, saying: "And if a group enters the mosque and finds that the imam has prayed, they pray individually. And if they pray in congregation, their prayer is sufficient for them, but I dislike it for them because it was not the practice of the Salaf."

The questioner : This is the statement of al-Shafi'i.

The Shaykh : Yes, and he said later: "And we have preserved that a group of the Companions of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) used to, when they entered the mosque and found that the imam had prayed, pray individually. And they were able to gather in the mosque again, but they did not do so because they disliked to gather in the mosque twice." I found this statement from this imam explicitly. Later, when I delved a bit into the study of the books of the Sunnah, I found that Imam al-Shafi'i relies on, or it seems that this is the statement of al-Hasan al-Basri, narrated in "Musannaf Ibn Abi Shaybah" in this sense, that . Later, as soon as I heard the adhan, I would leave the watch and the hand together and stand up to pray, and the matter was done. And rarely after that did I miss the congregational prayer.