Wearing one’s best clothes when offering the prayer

9-2-2009 | IslamWeb

Question:

I was recently told that when praying you have to get ready as if you were about to go out. Therefore at fajar time you have to get up comb your hair iron clothes get dressed and then pray. When i have been giving fajar salah i have at times worn my clean night cloths that i went to sleep in. They are salvaar kameez and i do be fully covered. i do wash face, teeth and do wudu and where clean scarf. I have found some hadith that clearly state that our prophet took time in getting ready for salah and in cleanliness but have not found anything that says my clothes have to be new and ironed as if i were about to go out somewhere. It is only fajar time that i have problem in getting changed into best cloths especially when fajar is very early and sometimes i go back to sleep after salah and reciting some surahs from the Quran. My question is do i have to wear my day clothes or am i still ok to wear my clean night clothes providing i am properly covered. I need to know so that if my thinking is wrong then i can put this in mind and offer salah better without thinking about these little things bothering me.

Answer:

All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad  sallallaahu  `alayhi  wa  sallam ( may  Allaah exalt his mention ) is His slave and Messenger.

 

Dear sister, you are not obliged to perform the prayer in ironed clothes, or to pray in the clothes that you wear when you go out, and you are not obliged to comb your hair before performing prayer, what is important is that you should perform the prayer in clothes that meet the conditions for the prayer, like being free from impurity and covering the whole body except the hands and face, and we are not aware of any narration of the Prophet  sallallaahu  `alayhi  wa  sallam ( may  Allaah exalt his mention ) which proves that he conditioned what you mentioned in the prayer.

Therefore, we advise you not to seek Fatwa from anyone so that he would not confuse you; rather, you should seek Fatwa from the scholars about matters and issues which you do not know.

For more benefit, please refer to Fatwa 88862.

Allaah Knows best.

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