Fatwa ID: 04696

Answered by: Maulana Ishaaq Hussain

Question

If we lose concentration in Salah and start thinking about other things do we have to do sajdah sahw?

If we mess a few letters and don’t know if it changed the whole meaning, do we have to do sajdah sahw?

In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

Answer 1

Your question will be answered in two parts.

Sajdah sahw becomes obligatory in the following circumstances:

1. Any Wajib act being omitted.
2. Any Wajib act being displaced, ie observing it before its time or later than its actual occasion of being observed.
3. Any Wajib act being delayed to the extent of one rukn ie the time taken to say Subhanallah three times.
4. Any Wajib act being altered ie loud recitation being recited in the place of silent recitation.
5. Any Fardh being displaced ie observing it before its time or later than the time for it to be observed.
6. Any Fardh act being repeated. (Raddul Mukhtar p.543 v.2)

If any of the above occur due to one’s forgetfulness the sajdah sahw will remedy the error, however, if a person deliberately missed the aforementioned, sajdah sahw will not be sufficient”.  (Mazaahirul Haq Jadeed p.650 v.1)

With regards to your first question, losing concentration and thinking about worldly things in salaah does not make sajdah sahw obligatory.

Answer 2

Observe the following rules.

1. If a person makes such a mistake in which the meaning of the Holy Quran changes then that salah will be invalid, irrespective of whether 3 verses of the Quran were read or not. (intentionally or unintentionally)
2. if the mistake was such that the harkats were changed ie in place of a zer you read zabar, then salah will not be invalid, however, if by changing the harkats the meaning of the verse changes then salah will be void.
3. If a person reads a certain letter instead of another letter and it was possible to differentiate between the two without any difficulty, then salah will break, however, if it was difficult to differentiate between the two, for example, seen and saad then if he did it intentionally salah will break otherwise it will be valid.
4. If a person added extra words in which the meaning of the verse changed then the salah will be invalid irrespective of whether the extra words are from the Quran or not.

These four rules are mentioned in the books of Fiqh.  (Fatawah Hindiyyah p79 v.1)

With regards to your second question if by making a mistake with the recitation as long as it did not change the meaning your salah will be valid, yes if you make a mistake you should correct the mistake and move on to the next verse, sajdah sahw will not be necessary.  (Fatawa Hindiyyah p.65 v.1, Aap Ke Masaail p.372 v.3)

Only Allah Knows Best

Written by Maulana Ishaaq Hussain

Checked and approved by Mufti Mohammed Tosir Miah

Darul Ifta Birmingham