Mistakes in Tajwid
Question:
Assalamu ‘alaykum.
I have some questions about salah; according to the Hanafi madhhab,
1) It is mentioned in one of your answers that some common mispronunciations of words are acceptable in salah. I wondered, where a double letter is pronounced as a single letter, would this also be acceptable? For example, if “walad ḍāllīn” was pronounced as “walad ḍālīn” (with one less L).
I have also heard that depending on where one takes a short pause when reciting a sura, the word changes. If you do, you change the ending of the word accordingly; is that acceptable?
2) If you say the same sura for all the rak’as of a prayer requiring a sura after al Fatiha, would that be acceptable? For example, if you recite sura al Ikhlas after al Fatiha in both the first and the second rak’as of maghrib. Do you need to recite a different sura for every rak’a of every prayer throughout the day? So if you recited al Ikhlas during Zuhr, would you be allowed to recite it in Asr?
Answer:
Wa ‘alaykum assalam wa rahmatullah wa barakatuh.
I pray you are well.
Mistakes in Tajwid
The earlier scholars of the Hanafi school were a bit stricter when it came to mistakes in the prayer. The later school settled on an easier position. So, reciting a letter with a shadda as one without a shadda will not invalidate the prayer. This is especially when the mistake is in vowels or replacing letters with other similarly pronounced letters.
In general, stopping at places where the meaning is affected negatively does not invalidate the prayer. A good practice for people who do not understand Arabic is to follow the stops present in the Indo-Pak Mughali script printing of the Qur’an. It makes things a lot easier.
Repeating Suras in a Prayer
If one is reciting the short suras, one should not repeat the same sura in a fard prayer in both units. And, if one is reciting from sura al Zalzala (Qur’an, 99) to the end, skipping a sura in favor of the next one and reciting in the reverse order of the Qur’an is disliked. This, however, does not affect the prayer, and one would not need to repeat it.
Yes, it is valid to recite the same few suras in all the prayers throughout the course of the day. So reciting sura al ‘Asr in the ‘Asr and then the Maghrib prayer is valid.
(Ibn ‘Abidin, Radd al Muhtar, Shurunbulali, Maraqi al Falah)
See if you can find a Tajwid teacher and learn how to recite well. It is part of the right of the Qur’an, “Recite the Qur’an well in a measured pace.” (Qur’an, 73:4)
May Allah grant you the best of both worlds.
[Shaykh] Abdul-Rahim
Checked and Approved by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani
Shaykh Abdul-Rahim Reasat began his studies in Arabic Grammar and Morphology in 2005. After graduating with a degree in English and History, he moved to Damascus in 2007, where, for 18 months, he studied with many erudite scholars. In late 2008 he moved to Amman, Jordan, where he continued his studies for the next six years in Sacred Law (fiqh), legal theory (Usul al-fiqh), theology, hadith methodology, hadith commentary, and Logic. He was also given licenses of mastery in the science of Quranic recital. He was able to study an extensive curriculum of Quranic sciences, tafsir, Arabic grammar, and Arabic eloquence.
