Invoking blessings on the Prophet (al-salat 'ala al-nabi)

Invoking blessings on the Prophet is a Muslim's prayer for his Prophet with blessing, peace and grace. It is the subject of Ahmed Abdussalam's programme 'Osalli Alayh', in which he invokes them often and explains their meaning and merit. ^{1 2 3} He cites the verse commanding blessings on the Prophet, noting that God begins with blessing him, then the angels, then commands the believers. ^{4 5 6}

He says that praying for the Prophet with blessing means asking God to multiply His praise of him before the angels and His mercies on him; God praised him before we ever did, so the benefit returns to the one who prays, and God records it for him as worship. ^{7 8 9} Peace, for him, means that God keep him safe in his life, as He protected him from people and sufficed him, and after his death, and keep safe his religion, whose preservation God has guaranteed. ^{10 11 12} Grace means that God place all the community's deeds in the scale of the Prophet's good deeds, since one who points to good is like one who does it. ^{13 14 15}

He says it is obligatory, that whoever hears the Prophet's name and does not invoke blessings on him is at fault, and cites a hadith on the loss of one in whose presence he is mentioned and who does not. ^{6 16 17} Among its merits he names God's tenfold blessing on whoever invokes one, and, by a hadith he relates from Gabriel, that a single blessing writes ten good deeds, erases ten bad ones and raises ten degrees. ^{18 19 20} By analogy he says that whoever invokes ten is blessed a hundred times, and whoever invokes a hundred, a thousand. ²¹ He cites the hadith of Ubayy ibn Ka'b, that one who gives all his prayer to the Prophet has his worry sufficed and his sin forgiven, and the hadith that those nearest the Prophet on the Day of Resurrection are those who invoke blessings on him most. ^{22 23 24} He sees invoking them often as a sign of God's favour, and says they calm people who quarrel. ^{25 21 26} He warns against letters on the lips whose meaning is not understood. ^{27 28}

This is the speaker's explanation as recorded, attributed to him. (needs_source: the exegetes' and jurists' statements on the meaning, ruling and occasions of invoking blessings on the Prophet have not yet been gathered in this run.)

Mustafa Hosny gives the twenty-fourth episode of his programme 'Hadaya al-Rahman' to invoking blessings on the Prophet: he cites a hadith that God answers one blessing on the Prophet with ten blessings on the one who invokes it, says any formula of blessing suffices, and explains God's blessing on a servant as His mercy, forgiveness, raising of his standing and the tranquillity He sends down on his heart. ^{29 30} He says those who invoke blessings on the Prophet most will sit closest to him on the Day of Resurrection and be nearest to his intercession. ^{31 32 33} He relates that Ubayy ibn Ka'b asked the Prophet how much of his prayer to give him, proposing a third, then a half, then two-thirds, the Prophet telling him each time as he wished and that more would be better, until he said he would give all of it and was told his worries would be sufficed and his sins forgiven; in Ahmed Abdussalam's telling of the same hadith in his programme 'Osalli Alayh', Ubayy's first proposal is a quarter. ^{31 34 32 35} He says an angel conveys a person's blessing to the Prophet at his grave and the Prophet returns the greeting; that the Companions asked how their blessings could reach him after his death and he told them the earth does not consume the bodies of prophets; and he states, 'as Ahl al-Sunna wa-l-Jama'a say', that the prophets are alive in their graves. ^{33 36} The secret of these gifts, for him, is that frequent blessing deepens attachment to the Prophet, the complete model of the godly servant, and a person is raised with those he loves; he urges viewers to invoke blessings on him at least a hundred times a day. ^{37 38 39}