Facing the qibla is an essential condition of prayer for Muslims. A piece in Sarabangla's religion and life section answers what happens when someone unknowingly prays facing another direction.

Verse 150 of Surah Al-Baqarah commands turning towards the Sacred Mosque: wherever you set out from and wherever you are, turn your face towards the Kaaba. The Prophet (peace be upon him) urged facing the qibla before standing for any prayer, obligatory or voluntary.

When the direction is in doubt, the article says, one must make every effort to be sure: ask someone local, or use a reliable app or compass. If there is no way to check, one decides by one's best judgement and prays.

If, after such effort, the direction turns out to have been wrong once the prayer is over, the soundest view is that it need not be prayed again. The article cites a narration in al-Bayhaqi's Sunan al-Kubra (2235): Jabir ibn Abdullah said that on a cloudy night on a journey the companions prayed in different directions by their own judgement, and found in the morning that the qibla lay elsewhere; the Prophet told them their prayer was sufficient.

The jurist Mahmud ibn Mazah also held that a prayer offered on one's best judgement after proper inquiry counts as valid even if it later proves wrong. If the correct direction becomes known during the prayer, one turns to it at once without breaking the prayer.

Photo: rosie Summers / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Source: Sarabangla