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The Confirmed Sunna Rakats & The Recommended Ones

Answered as per Hanafi Fiqh by Qibla.com

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani

I’ve always been taught that the sunnah prayers are as follows:
* 2 before fajr
* 2 or 4 before Dhuhr and 2 after
* 2 before Asr
* 2 after Maghrib
* 2 after Isha then witr
The other day I was talking to someone who was doing a bunch more and said that in the Hanafi madhab this was the way it is suggested. I cant even begin to remember how many, but it was a lot. Do you know anything about this?

Answer:
In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful

Walaikum assalam,

What you mention is true in the Shafi`i school. The only difference, in terms of confirmed sunnas, in the Hanafi school is that the pre-fard sunna of Zuhr is 4 rakats. Two would not fulfill the sunna.

Besides the confirmed sunnas, there are many non-confirmed sunnas related to the fards, such as praying

  • 4 rakats after Zuhr (either by making the 2 confirmed sunna rakats 4, or separately),
  • 4 or 2 rakats before Asr
  • 6 rakats (salat al-awwabin) after Maghrib, ideally in sets of two (the confirmed sunna can be included as part of the 6 if one chooses)
  • 2 rakats before Isha
  • 4 rakats after isha (one can include the confirmed sunnas in this if one wishes).

And Allah knows best.

Wassalam,
Faraz Rabbani

This answer was indexed from Qibla.com, which used to have a repository of Islamic Q&A answered by various scholars. The website is no longer in existence. It has now been transformed into a learning portal with paid Islamic course offering under the brand of Kiflayn.