Discussion of the hadith regarding moving the finger during the tashahhud, and that it is an addition by a trustworthy narrator.

The questioner : The hadith about moving the finger is an addition...

The Shaykh : What kind of addition?

The questioner : An addition in... the hadith of the finger.

The Shaykh : Yes, have you read the response to that? Did you read the response or not?

The questioner: No.

The Shaykh : I have not read it. Read the response in detail, which I believe is in "Tammam al-Mannah fi al-Ta'liq 'ala Fiqh al-Sunnah," but there is no harm in summarizing it, and you should look into the details by reviewing... This trustworthy narrator is associated with two things. The first is that he was described as a trustworthy narrator who is firm in what he narrates from all his sheikhs, and his sheikh here is 'Asim ibn Kulaib, upon whom the chains of transmission revolved. So this is the first reason I relied on accepting his addition of the movement.
The second reason is that the movement does not contradict the pointing that came in the other chains of transmission and in other hadiths, such as the hadith of Ibn 'Umar and the hadith of Ibn Jubayr and the like.
The third reason—and this is very important for those new to seeking this knowledge—is that everyone who spoke about this hadith authenticated it, and none of them, neither before nor after, hinted at its weakness. This is unlike some of our brothers today, the students of knowledge, who looked only at the mere uniqueness of this narration and did not look at the fact that he is a trustworthy and firm narrator, nor did they look at the fact that the imams who authenticated it had no contradicting opinion, and then they did not look at the fact that the meaning of the movement does not contradict the pointing. This is a very important matter; because if you act in this way, come so-and-so, and one person says, "I saw him moving his hand," and another says, "He pointed with his hand," there is no contradiction between this wording and that. All that is the case is that the movement adds clarification. If there is a clarification that does not contradict what it clarifies, our previous discussion is absolutely not applicable. This is if it were alone; what do you say when the other two accompanying factors are added to it? This is the summary of what I mentioned there; so you are able to refer back to it.
And here it reminds usThe questioner : of something I have always pointed out: that many of our brothers who are eager to follow the Sunnah move it like this, for example this thigh, and they do it like this. This is called lowering and raising. Look now at the precision in the narration and in the meaning. It did not come in the hadith that he lowered and raised. It came that he raised his hands; he used to raise and lower in the takbirs of transition. As for moving the finger, only the movement came. So if you do it like this, you have moved it. But if you do it like this, you have added lowering and raising to the movement, so you have added to the text. If the hadith had said "lowered and raised," you should do it like this. But if the hadith did not say "lowered and raised" and only said "moved," then you must only move it. So the movement is the Sunnah. Lowering is not the Sunnah. Lowering, as you see, and I will add clarification by saying: of the Sunnah related to the one sitting for the tashahhud is that he directs his index finger toward the qiblah, and does not lower it like this, throwing it to the ground. And this is also negligence, because what do some people do? They go... like this. They have contradicted the Sunnah here in its upright position and its direction toward the qiblah. So you are directing it toward the qiblah while at the same time moving it. But if you lower and raise it, you have failed to direct it toward the qiblah, because when you throw it to the ground, you are not facing the qiblah, just as if a person deviates to the right or to the left or the like. This is what relates to the topic of the movement. Yes.

The questioner : ... Some scholars say that there is no harm in leaning on the left hand, and there is no harm in performing the hibt (sitting with knees drawn up) on Friday while the imam is delivering the khutbah, because there is a consideration in the hadith. What is this consideration? What is the ruling on this?

The Shaykh : Are you asking one question or two?

The questioner: Two questions.

The Shaykh : Okay, so separate one question from the other.