Remembrance of Allah — Page 16
16 attained success. ’ ( S a hīh al-Bukh ā r ī , Kitābul-Īmān, Bāb az-Zakātu min al-Islām; Hadith 46) From this we learn that the person who fulfils the obligatory affairs properly, achieves success. However, the prudent and far- sighted person does not restrict himself to the discharge of only obligatory matters, but rather he enters the field of Naw a fil so that if there remained any shortcoming in the observance of the oblig- atory works, they may be compensated for in this way. For example, five daily Prayers have been prescribed for the day and night. A person who offers these Prayers but does not offer the Naw a fil [Prayers] may run into a situation possibly that due to some error on his part, one of his Prayers gets rejected. So, on the Day of Judgement he will have to face the penalty for this shortcoming. Thus, it is narrated in a hadith that once when the Holy Prophet s as was present in the mosque, a person came and offered his Prayer. He asked him to repeat his Prayer, so the man offered his Prayer again. The Holy Prophet s as asked him to repeat it again, and so the man offered his Prayer for a third time. When the Holy Prophet s as asked him to offer it for the fourth time, he said, ‘O Messenger of Allah, by God I do not know how to pray better than this; tell me how I should offer the Prayer. ’ The Holy Prophet s as responded, ‘You were rushing with your Prayer and there fore it was not accepted. Pray slowly’ ( S a hīh al-Bukh ā r ī , Kitābul-Azān, Bāb Wujūbil-Qir’ati Lil-Imāmi wal-Ma’mūmi fi s- S alawāti Kullihā fil- H a d ari was-Safari wa mā Yujharu fīhā wa mā Yukhāfatu; Hadith 757). 5 Thus, errors of this type sometimes occur, as a consequence