Wudu (ablution)

Wudu — from wada'a, "beauty and cleanliness" — is, in juristic usage, the use of pure water on the four limbs (face, hands, head, feet) in the prescribed manner; it lifts the minor ritual impurity as ghusl lifts the major one. ^{1 2}

The Hanafis define it as washing and wiping specific limbs; the Malikis as a water purification attached to the four limbs in a specified way; the Shafi'is as specific acts opened by intention; the Hanbalis as using pure water on the four limbs in ordered succession with the other obligations. ¹

The majority of jurists held that wudu belongs to the earlier revealed laws and is not exclusive to this community, citing its attribution to earlier prophets; a minority counted it among this community's distinguishing marks, citing the hadith of ghurra and tahjil — "you will come to me radiant with the traces of wudu". ^{2 3}

Jurists agreed that wudu was ordained in Mecca together with prayer, and that no prayer was ever transmitted without it — "no prayer is accepted from one in a state of hadath until he performs wudu". It was obligatory for every prayer in early Islam until, as they relate, that obligation was lifted at the Battle of the Trench except in the case of hadath, so that one wudu may now serve many prayers while remaining recommended. ^{3 4}

Wudu and tayammum both lift ritual impurity, but wudu is a water rite for minor hadath while tayammum serves for both minor and major hadath using clean earth; the Lawgiver even called tayammum "wudu" since it stands in its place — "clean earth is the Muslim's wudu". ^{3 4}