If the ground or the surface on which the prayer mat is placed is pure and clean, but the ground is impure or unclean, is this forbidden, and is it permissible?

The questioner : This questioner asks: If the ground or the place on which a person places his prayer mat is pure and clean, but the ground is impure or unclean, is this forbidden? And is it permissible if the mat is pure but what is underneath it is impure?

The Shaykh : There is no prohibition in this. That is, it is not forbidden for a person to place his mat on something impure that is dry and pray on it, except if that impurity has a smell that bothers the person in his prayer, in which case he should not pray on it so that he is not bothered by it. This is because what the worshiper directly touches is pure.
Also included in this is what often happens in courtyards that have a latrine, but it is buried and covered up. A person prays on it, and there is no blame on him. As for the dislike expressed by some scholars of this, because one is relying on something on which prayer is not valid, there is a need to look into this. Because in the case of the mat, if one places it on an impure place, he does not directly touch the impurity, and he does not directly touch the impurity if he prays on the roof of the latrine.