Breaking Your Fast – Do You Eat First, or Pray First?

Anas b. Mālik reported from the Prophet ﷺ that he said:

If the iqāmah for prayer is given while one of you is fasting, let him begin with the evening meal before the Maghrib prayer, and do not rush from your evening meal.”

Sh. al-Albānī (رَحِمَهُ اللهُ) mentions that the addition “while one of you is fasting” does not negate other narrations which omit these words because the versions without these additional words are still absolute in any case, thereby encompassing the one who is fasting, and the one who is not. Rather, the fasting person is more deserving of this concession than the non-fasting person, as is obvious.

Source: Jāmiʿ Turāth al-ʿAllāmah al-Albānī fī al-Fiqh (10: 177). See: al-Ṣaḥīḥah (3964).

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