Is it established that the Friday prayer has a four-rak'ah Sunnah (supererogatory prayer) performed before it?
"The supererogatory regular (ratibah) prayers before the Friday prayer (Jumu'ah) are a matter about which scholars have differed. This is an issue of ijtihad (independent reasoning) that should not be a cause for dispute or fanaticism. Any disagreement regarding it must be referred back to the Quran and Sunnah.
The hadiths and narrations that speak about prayer before Jumu'ah do not indicate that it is a regular supererogatory (ratibah) prayer; rather, they refer to general voluntary (nafl mutlaq) prayers. No regular supererogatory prayer before Jumu'ah has been authentically established from the Prophet (peace be upon him), nor was there a specific time for its performance during his era.
Al-Hafiz Ibn Hajar said: 'As for the Sunnah prayer before Jumu'ah, nothing has been established concerning it.' Ibn al-Qayyim said: 'Jumu'ah is like Eid; it has no Sunnah prayer before it. This is the sounder of the two opinions of the scholars, and the Sunnah supports it.'
The argument for the existence of a pre-Jumu'ah Sunnah by analogy with Dhuhr prayer is a flawed analogy, as Jumu'ah is an independent prayer, and the Sunnah is not established through analogy in such matters."
Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026
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