Al-Ma'un · Makki · ayah 5 of 7

Al-Ma'un 107:5

ٱلَّذِينَ هُمْ عَن صَلَاتِهِمْ سَاهُونَ

“[But] who are heedless of their prayer[2000] -”

Saheeh International

Essence

A mind that wanders in prayer is human; the warning is for the one whose whole heart has wandered away from prayer.

A reflection

Of, not in

One small word in this ayah has comforted believers for centuries. It says ʿan ṣalātihim: heedless of their prayer. It does not say fī ṣalātihim: heedless in it. Early believers used to praise Allah for that choice of word. One Companion is reported to have said that had it said 'in their prayer', it would have been about the believers.

The lexicons draw the line sharply. To be heedless in a thing is to leave part of it without knowing. To be heedless of a thing is to leave it while knowing.

Heedless in prayer is the mind that drifts to the shopping list, the argument, the email. Hardly any Muslim is free of it. Both Sahihs report that the Prophet ﷺ himself once ended a four-unit prayer after two, and was reminded. One classical scholar goes further. Anyone who never wanders at all in prayer, he says, is probably not pondering it. His only concern is counting the units. He eats the husk and throws away the kernel.

Heedless of prayer is something else. It is a life in which prayer no longer matters: delayed, dropped, or done without caring whether it was done at all.

A Companion's son once asked his father about this ayah. Which of us does not let his mind wander? Which of us does not talk to himself in prayer? Saʿd ibn Abī Waqqāṣ answered: that is not it. It is letting the prayer's time be wasted.

So if you worry that your wandering mind makes you a hypocrite, the worry itself is a good sign. The one this ayah describes does not worry. He has stopped noticing the prayer at all.

The cure for a wandering mind is not despair. It is returning, again and again, the way a hand returns to a steering wheel. Each return is itself an act of worship.

The full entry has 6 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.