What is the most authentic report from the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) regarding the tashahhud?
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The questioner : The tahiyyat is the most authentic report from the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him).
The Shaykh : All praise is due to Allah; we praise Him, seek His help, and seek His forgiveness. We seek refuge in Allah from the evil of our own souls and from the badness of our deeds. Whomsoever Allah guides, none can misguide, and whomsoever He misguides, none can guide. And I bear witness that there is no deity worthy of worship except Allah alone, with no partner, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His slave and His Messenger.
Move forward, as long as there is no loudspeaker, so that the latecomer can hear, if Allah wills.
The Companions of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) did not know the tashahhud in the sitting of the tashahhud, and so they would recite some words from themselves, glorifying Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) as it seemed to them. So the prayer of the one praying, "Peace be upon Allah", this is what befits the station of Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He), because "Peace" is one of the names of Allah, so it is as if the servant is returning the name of Allah to Allah, and this is not befitting.
And so the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) taught them, and he taught them well, and he said to them:Sunan an-Nasa'i 1279Sahih (Darussalam) He (peace be upon him) said: Sunan Abi Dawud 968Sahih (Al-Albani) So from this, the tashahhud became obligatory upon the prayeers, and it was not obligatory before that. And there came a concise hadith from Ibn Mas'ud himself explicitly stating that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) made the recitation of the tashahhud in prayer obligatory. So from that day, the tashahhud became an obligation among the obligations of prayer.
The scholars differed in the past regarding the ruling of this tashahhud. Some said what came in the hadith, that it is obligatory (fard), and some said it is obligatory (wajib). I do not want to delve now into explaining the difference between fard and wajib, because first, the saying that it is fard is the weaker position, for fard is wajib and wajib is fard; it is merely a term used by some schools of jurisprudence.
And you have known, and secondly, that this is contrary to the position of the majority of scholars and contrary to the previous hadith that the tashahhud in prayer is obligatory (fard), meaning that the Messenger made it obligatory by revelation from the Lord of the Worlds. So after this new legislation, it is not permissible for anyone to be lax in leaving the tashahhud in the sitting of the tashahhud. And this formula that you heard, we must mention two matters regarding it:
The first is the answer to the questioner's question, which is that this formula is the best and most authentic of the formulas that came from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). And although there are other formulas, which I have enumerated and collected in my book "The Description of the Prayer of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) from the Takbir to the Taslim, as if you are seeing it," the most authentic of these tashahhuds is the tashahhud of Ibn Mas'ud. This is because al-Bukhari and Muslim agreed in their Sahihs to single it out, and because the scholars of hadith unanimously hold that this formula is more authentic than the other formulas. There is a second well-known formula, which is the one adopted by Imam al-Shafi'i, and it differs somewhat from the tashahhud of Ibn Mas'ud. In some narrations, so among the reasons that led some hadith scholars to prefer the narration of Ibn Mas'ud for this formula over the narration of Ibn Abbas is that Ibn Mas'ud was an early Companion, whereas Ibn Abbas was a late Companion, because the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) died when he was close to reaching the age of accountability.
Also, the narrators did not differ on the hadith of Ibn Mas'ud, not even in a single letter, for they all narrated this formula as the Ummah agreed to narrate the opening of the Book (al-Fatihah) without any difference, not even in a single letter.
Likewise, the tashahhud of Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him), all the narrators who narrated it preserved it letter for letter. And there is no wonder in that, because Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) was so concerned with teaching it to his Companions after the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), those Companions of Ibn Mas'ud who did not meet the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). So Ibn Mas'ud taught it to his Companions, among them was 'Alqamah. And 'Alqamah said about Ibn Mas'ud that he "used to make us memorize the tashahhud down to the single letter". When Ibn Mas'ud taught them the tashahhud, he made them memorize it down to the single letter.
And so the Companions of Ibn Mas'ud followed one another in narrating the formula of the tashahhud of Ibn Mas'ud letter for letter, with absolutely no difference among them, unlike the tashahhud of Ibn Abbas. So if the question is which formula is more authentic, you have known the answer: it is the hadith of Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him), and you have known the reasons, which are multiple and numerous.
The Shaykh : All praise is due to Allah; we praise Him, seek His help, and seek His forgiveness. We seek refuge in Allah from the evil of our own souls and from the badness of our deeds. Whomsoever Allah guides, none can misguide, and whomsoever He misguides, none can guide. And I bear witness that there is no deity worthy of worship except Allah alone, with no partner, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His slave and His Messenger.
Move forward, as long as there is no loudspeaker, so that the latecomer can hear, if Allah wills.
The Companions of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) did not know the tashahhud in the sitting of the tashahhud, and so they would recite some words from themselves, glorifying Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) as it seemed to them.
So one of them, when he sat in the tashahhud, would say: "Peace be upon Allah, peace be upon Jibril, peace be upon the righteous servants of Allah." So he (peace and blessings be upon him) said to them: "Indeed, Allah is the Peace."
فكان أحدهم إذا جلس في التشهد يقول السلام على الله السلام على جبريل السلام على عباد الله الصالحين فقال لهم عليه الصلاة والسلام إن الله هو السلامAnd so the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) taught them, and he taught them well, and he said to them:
so when any one of you sits (during the prayer), let him say: At-tahiyyatu lillahi wasalawatu wat-tayibaat, as-salamu 'alaika ayah-Nabiyyu wa rahmatAllahi wa baraktuhu. As-salamu 'alaina a 'ala ibad illahis-salihin
إذا جلس أحدكم في التشهد فليقل التحيات لله والصلوات والطيبات السلام عليك أيها النبي ورحمة الله وبركاته السلام علينا وعلى عباد الله الصالحينThen he may choose any supplication which pleases him and offer it.
ثم ليتخير أحدكم من الدعاء ما شاءThe scholars differed in the past regarding the ruling of this tashahhud. Some said what came in the hadith, that it is obligatory (fard), and some said it is obligatory (wajib). I do not want to delve now into explaining the difference between fard and wajib, because first, the saying that it is fard is the weaker position, for fard is wajib and wajib is fard; it is merely a term used by some schools of jurisprudence.
And you have known, and secondly, that this is contrary to the position of the majority of scholars and contrary to the previous hadith that the tashahhud in prayer is obligatory (fard), meaning that the Messenger made it obligatory by revelation from the Lord of the Worlds. So after this new legislation, it is not permissible for anyone to be lax in leaving the tashahhud in the sitting of the tashahhud. And this formula that you heard, we must mention two matters regarding it:
The first is the answer to the questioner's question, which is that this formula is the best and most authentic of the formulas that came from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). And although there are other formulas, which I have enumerated and collected in my book "The Description of the Prayer of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) from the Takbir to the Taslim, as if you are seeing it," the most authentic of these tashahhuds is the tashahhud of Ibn Mas'ud. This is because al-Bukhari and Muslim agreed in their Sahihs to single it out, and because the scholars of hadith unanimously hold that this formula is more authentic than the other formulas. There is a second well-known formula, which is the one adopted by Imam al-Shafi'i, and it differs somewhat from the tashahhud of Ibn Mas'ud.
The tahiyyat and the good things are for Allah.
التحيات الطيبات للهThe pure things.
الزاكياتAlso, the narrators did not differ on the hadith of Ibn Mas'ud, not even in a single letter, for they all narrated this formula as the Ummah agreed to narrate the opening of the Book (al-Fatihah) without any difference, not even in a single letter.
Likewise, the tashahhud of Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him), all the narrators who narrated it preserved it letter for letter. And there is no wonder in that, because Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) was so concerned with teaching it to his Companions after the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), those Companions of Ibn Mas'ud who did not meet the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). So Ibn Mas'ud taught it to his Companions, among them was 'Alqamah. And 'Alqamah said about Ibn Mas'ud that he "used to make us memorize the tashahhud down to the single letter". When Ibn Mas'ud taught them the tashahhud, he made them memorize it down to the single letter.
And so the Companions of Ibn Mas'ud followed one another in narrating the formula of the tashahhud of Ibn Mas'ud letter for letter, with absolutely no difference among them, unlike the tashahhud of Ibn Abbas. So if the question is which formula is more authentic, you have known the answer: it is the hadith of Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him), and you have known the reasons, which are multiple and numerous.