The Friday Prayer (Jumu^ah)

Friday is the best day of the week.

The Prophet, sallallahu ^alayhi wa sallam, said:

خَيْرُ يَوْمٍ طَلَعَتْ عَلَيْهِ الشَّمْسُ يَوْمُ الْجُمُعَةِ فِيهِ خُلِقَ ءَادَمُ وَفِيهِ أُدْخِلَ الْجَنَّةَ وَفِيهِ أُخْرِجَ مِنْهَا.

Khayru yawmin tala^at ^alayhish-shamsu yawmul-jumu^ah. Fihi khuliqa Adam, wa fihi udkhilal-jannah, wa fihi ukhrija minha.

Which means: “Friday is the best day on which the Sun ever rose. In it Adam was created, admitted into Paradise, and taken out of it.” (Narrated by Muslim.)

Allah, ta^ala, made it obligatory to pray the Friday prayer (Jumu^ah) during this day. As a result, the Muslims in all the different countries gather in the main masjid of their town to pray this prayer.

The Friday Prayer (Jumu^ah) is a personal obligation upon the free, residing, pubescent, and unexcused males. (Among what is considered an Islamic excuse is for the person to be sick in a way that going to the mosque is a serious hardship on him.)

It is an obligation to pray the Friday Prayer (Jumu^ah) in congregation (jama^ah) if the free, pubescent, and unexcused male inhabitants are forty (40) in number and living in buildings, not in tents.

The Friday Prayer is also obligatory upon the men who intend to stay in the town of Jumu^ah for four whole days, excluding the day of entry and the day of exit, and upon those who reside out of the town, but can hear the resounding call of a person who is standing at its edge closest to them.

The Friday Prayer is two rak^ahs instead of the Dhuhr prayer. It is performed in congregation and preceded by two speeches that the imam gives. The Friday Prayer has other conditions that must be satisfied to be valid. Similarly, the two speeches have integrals and conditions.

The Conditions of the Friday Prayer:

1-       The setting in of Dhuhr prayer time.

2-       The two speeches must be heard by the forty men.

3-       The prayer has to have been performed in congregation by the forty inhabitants.

4-       Another Jumu^ah Prayer must not be performed simultaneously in the same town. If the opening Allahu akbar of one prayer preceded that of another, the former would be valid and the latter would be invalid. However, if it was hard for the people to meet in one place, then in as many places as was needed, the Prayers, both earlier and later, would be valid.

Integrals of the Two Speeches:

1-       To say al-hamdulillah in both speeches.

2-       To perform the Salah ^alan-Nabiyy, sallallahu ^alayhi wa sallam, in both speeches

3-       To command the audience to be God-fearing (to have taqwa) in both speeches.

4-       To recite an ayah that has a complete meaning in either of the two speeches (it is better for this ayah to be in the first speech).

5-       To say a supplication (du^a’ ) for the believers in the second speech.

The conditions of the two speeches:

1-       Purification from both states of ritual impurity and from najas-filth on the body, clothes, place, and what is carried by the speaker.

2-       To cover the unlawful nakedness.

3-       To stand up.

4-       To sit between the two speeches.

5-       To observe the succession without lengthy interruption between the integrals of the two speeches, and between the two speeches and the prayer.

6-       To say the integrals of the two speeches in Arabic. So if the speaker says the integrals in Arabic and the rest in another language, the speeches are valid.