This is the prayer of Abu Hanifah.

This is the prayer of Abu Hanifah.” The king said, “If this prayer is not (proved to be) of Abu Hanifah I would kill you because no religious person can approve such a prayer.” (But) Hanafis denied that it was prescribed thus by Abu Hanifah. Then the books of Iraqis (Hanafis) were procured. The King ordered a Christian Persian teacher to read the acts of both religions. The prayer performed by Qifal was found according to the religion of Abu Hanifah.

Hence the King left the religion of Abu Hanifah and became a Shafei. And if this prayer be presented before even an ignorant person, he would not be ready to accept it.” [^1] This incident is also quoted on the authority of Mughisul Khalq in Ikhtisarul Afham and also Wafiaytul Ayan Tarikh Ibn Khallikan. [^2] This Qifal Maroozi is the great Imam, Abdullah bin Ahmad bin Abdullah Al-Maroozi, who was a mystic Shaykh of Khorasan.

Ibn Jamata in Tabqaat Fuqaha and Imam Yafai in his history have written about him: “Neither was there a greater jurist in his time nor would there be any after him.

We used to say that it is an angel in a human form.” Imam Yafai has also mentioned the year of this incident in his history that: “This incident took place in 410 A.H.” Possibly the Rizwan editor would also say like the courtiers of King Mahmud Ghaznavi, “All these are accusations on the great Imam (r.a.) and he never approved such prayer.” Therefore, I present the sources of these strange rules of prayer as follows: First fundamental - Permission to pray in a dog skin The following law is present in the book of Hanafi jurisprudence, Hidaya: [^3] “Every tanned skin is pure: It is permissible to pray in it and ablution with a vessel made of it is correct provided that it is not the skin of a pig or a human being.” It clearly proves that one can perform prayers wearing any skin except that of human or pig and water stored in a water-bag made out of it can be used for ablution.

It may be skin of dog, monkey or a bear. Not only this, one can also make a prayer mat out of dog skin. The following wordings are present in Fatawa Qazi Khan .[^4] “Natiqi has given the verdict of Muhammad bin Hasan, a student of Imam Abu Hanifah that if someone prays on a skin of a slaughtered dog or wolf, his prayer is correct.” This was a favor bestowed by a student and successor of the great Imam.

Now read a saying of another student, Imam Abu Yusuf that there is no need of tanning the dog skin, it is enough to just slaughter it.