about how to move the finger during the tashahhud.

The questioner : Regarding moving the finger and taking our sister in the tashahhud, and there is also a family connection, meaning the most binding thing for me is mercy for my father's sister, my father's sister saw us moving our fingers in the tashahhud, and he said to her, "By Allah, I am under an oath of divorce if you move it a second time, I will cut it off for you."

The Shaykh : This is a serious matter.

The questioner : My master, regarding the tashahhud, some people when they pray "I bear witness that there is no god but Allah and I bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah" lower their finger, and some people say that whoever says "The greetings" finishes before completing the last one. Is there anything authentic from the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) about how he prayed, how he performed the tashahhud?

The Shaykh : First of all, you must be clear on a legal principle. Allah Blessed and Exalted is He says in His noble Book: The merciful ones do not differ because their reference is one. Allah said, the Messenger of Allah said. The second thing, He the Mighty and Majestic said: Meaning there are two conflicting statements, one must be the truth and the second is wrong. Therefore, he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: So it is right and wrong, not all right and not all wrong, but right and wrong. If you know this reality, and it must always be fixed in the mind of every Muslim, then it is obligatory to know where these different statements came from. I will mention to you what is in the books of the schools of jurisprudence, more than what I mentioned. The first statement is that there is no moving of the finger at all, meaning from the moment you place your palm on your knee in the tashahhud, your palm remains as it is, saying "I bear witness that there is no god but Allah," you do not raise your finger nor do you clench it. This is the school of some of the early Hanafis, and some of them exaggerated and said that whoever raises his finger, his prayer is invalid. This is the first statement found among the scholars of the Muslims: there is no difference between the right and the left; he moves the finger of the left, not the right. The second statement is that you raise only the index finger and do not clench your other fingers, like this. This is the second statement. The third statement is that you clench and then raise your finger. And this clenching also has details, there are two statements regarding the form of the clenching, we will pass over it for now. They differed on when the raising occurs. Some say when "la" (no) is said, "I say 'la ilaha illa Allah'." Some say when you want to say "illa" (except), do not raise your finger and place "illa," "la ilaha illa Allah," you place it. Some say you raise it at "illa Allah" and keep it raised until the end of the tashahhud. And some say as soon as you sit in the tashahhud, you clench your fingers and loop the thumb and middle finger and raise the index finger, and you keep moving it until the taslim until you exit the prayer. All these statements have no evidence at all, not one hadith, but only opinion and independent legal reasoning, except for the last statement. And I am now hearing the hadith from you, no blame on you, you are scholars, and you can barely be counted among students of knowledge, yet the last statement will become clear to you: this is what the hadith of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) indicated. There was a man from the Companions of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) named Wail ibn Hujr, a Yemeni, who emigrated from Yemen to Madinah to see the Messenger and believe in him. He describes the prayer of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) and says, "When he sat for the tashahhud, he placed his left palm on his left knee and his right palm on his right knee." Notice, you walk with me step by step. The Messenger sat, placed the left on the left knee and the right on the right knee, clenched his fingers, looped the thumb and middle finger, and raised the index finger. "I saw him moving it, supplicating with it." I saw him moving it, there is also movement. Supplicating with it means he continues until the supplication at the end of the tashahhud. So this is the correct statement: to clench, raise, and move from the beginning of sitting to the end of the tashahhud. This is the correct statement, and there is nothing else in the Sunnah at all.