The Shaykh’s remarks on prayer after the Asr prayer.

The Shaykh : Praise is 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 evil of our deeds. Whomsoever Allah guides, none can misguide, and whomsoever He leaves to misguide, none can guide. And I bear witness that there is no deity but Allah alone, with no partner, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His slave and His Messenger. As for what follows, the best of speech is the speech of Allah, the best of guidance is the guidance of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him and his family), and the worst of matters are their innovations, and every innovation is a misguidance, and every misguidance is in the Fire. It is perhaps appropriate, since we have come to you after the Asr prayer, at a time in which the Shari'ah has established the dislike of prayer, that you have noticed that I, along with some of our brothers who came with us, did not sit down until we had prayed two rak'ahs. Some of the attendees who know the legal ruling I mentioned earlier, namely the dislike of prayer after the Asr prayer, may wonder about the status of this prayer performed by these brothers. Our answer to that is: first, religion is sincere advice; and second, among the best things that a person with some knowledge should do is to clarify it for people and not conceal it. This is knowledge that is considered unknown to the general public, though in reality it is well-known in the Sunnah. It is this kind of knowledge that a scholar or a student of knowledge should clarify for people and not conceal, especially when people frequently encounter such matters, whether positively or negatively. I mean that a Muslim must inevitably enter the mosque at such a disliked time. This is something no Muslim can do without knowing: if he enters the mosque at a time of dislike like this, what is his obligation? Does he sit in accordance with the general rule, which is established in his saying (peace be upon him): Or are there exceptions to this rule? This is the reality that every accountable Muslim must know: this rule is not absolute. That is, the dislike of prayer at the known times is not absolute, but rather it is restricted by many conditions. I do not want to give you a fiqh lecture on prayer now, as we are currently in the month of fasting. However, I must mention what relates to this occasion you witnessed, which is prayer after Asr. I say: The prayer known among scholars as the greeting of the mosque is among the exceptions to that general rule: "There is no prayer after Asr until the sun sets, except..." There are many exceptions, and as I said earlier, there is no occasion now to explain or enumerate them. Among those exceptions is the greeting of the mosque, because the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) said: Here, of course, there is a very precise fiqh detail, as two general texts conflict: This is a general text, and his saying: is also a general text. Which of the two general texts takes precedence? The discussion requires some detail, and there is no need to delve into it now, unless Allah (Mighty and Majestic) extends and blesses the time, and one of the attendees wishes to request a detailed explanation of that. I am ready to do so after we have finished answering the rulings related to the month of fasting. But I must also mention a very important issue related to what we are discussing at this time, which is his saying (peace be upon him): This general text is not absolute; it came restricted in two hadiths. One is from the hadith of 'Ali ibn Abi Talib (may Allah be pleased with him), and the other is from the hadith of Anas ibn Malik (may Allah be pleased with him). Each of them narrated from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) a restriction of the general hadith: They said, or he said—meaning 'Ali and Anas (may Allah be pleased with them), the narrators of the hadith—with the following restriction: The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) forbade prayer after Asr unless the sun is high and clear. So this is a broader matter than the previous one. In the previous matter, we said that the greeting is at the time of dislike, even if that is when the sun turns yellow. But the time now is before the sun turns yellow; it is, as you see, white and clear. So if a Muslim wishes to perform voluntary prayer after the Asr prayer, as long as the sun has not yet turned yellow, he may do so. And the evidence for this, with which I conclude this word related to the occasion of prayer after Asr, is what Imam al-Bukhari and Muslim narrated in their Sahihs from the hadith of the Lady 'A'ishah (may Allah be pleased with her). She said: The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) said: "The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) did not enter after the Asr prayer on any day without praying two rak'ahs in my house." This is a clear text that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family), when he prayed Asr in the mosque and entered 'A'ishah's house, would pray two rak'ahs. And some of the Salaf who were aware of 'A'ishah's hadith acted upon this, among them her cousin 'Abdullah ibn al-Zubayr (may Allah be pleased with him). With this, I conclude this word and begin a word appropriate, if Allah wills, to the place or station we are in, where we all know