Reconciling Ibn Taymiyyah’s statement on the essential nature of congregational prayer with the statement of the caller

'Umar al-Ashqar: All right, how does Ibn Taymiyyah, who holds that it is an essential pillar, deal with the hadith ?

The Shaykh : This is, as I said, a legal excuse. I mean, Ibn Taymiyyah himself follows those rules; that is a general rule for him, and this is an exception, like combining the two prayers, for example, in the case of travel or in the case of residence if it is to remove hardship. There is absolutely no contradiction. And therefore, I like a rule of Ibn Hazm, because we mentioned it just now, meaning in response to him, after what he said. I like very good speech from him that when two texts conflict, we exclude the lesser from the greater. This is very beautiful speech, and by it many, many, very many problems are resolved. We exclude the lesser from the greater, meaning the lesser is opposed to the greater, so if this lesser is excluded from it, it is in the sense of the general and the specific, meaning, but his expression...