Islamic Fiqh > Purification (Tahara) > Impurities (najasat) and vessels > The particular cases of impurities
Contents
Updated on 27 September 2026 at 3:52 AM
The sheets on this page deal with the particular cases of impurities: the dog's saliva and the washing of the vessel, the skin of the carrion and its tanning, the droppings and urine of animals, beasts of prey and birds of prey, purification without water, the khuff reached by an impurity and the hems of garments women trail in the streets.
Every ruling is reported with its proofs and takhrij; the measured thresholds of excuse are detailed in the schools' divergences page.
Su'r is the remainder left by the animal's mouth in what it licked or started to eat. The majority of jurists, Hanafis, Shafi'is and Hanbalis, declare it impure: when the dog licks a vessel, its washing is obligatory, seven times one of them with earth among the Shafi'is and the Hanbalis, three times among the Hanafis. The sheet cites:
The purification of the vessel of one of you, when the dog licks it, consists in washing it seven times, the first with earth.
narrated by Muslim (279)
Al-Nawawi justifies: without impurity, the order to pour would be a waste of property we were forbidden to lose; and purification is said only of an event or an impurity, the event being impossible here, so the purification of the impurity is required. Seven washings one of them with earth is the view of our school, of Malik, of Ahmad and of the multitude; Abu Hanifa judges that three washings suffice. The reported variants, the first with earth, the last or the first, the seventh with earth, the eighth sprinkled with earth, show that the specification is not a condition: once suffices; and the "eighth" of our school and of the multitude means: wash seven times one of them with earth mixed with water, the earth standing for a washing, hence its name of eighth. There is no difference, among the Shafi'is, between the licking and the rest of the dog's parts: urine, excrement, blood, sweat, hair, saliva or a member touching a pure thing while one of the two is wet, the washing is seven times one of them with earth. Az-Zayla'i adds that the order to pour proves impurity, and that the word "the purification of the vessel" attests it: the texts must bear a reasonable sense, and the reasonable sense prevails, given the rarity of worship devoid of reason. Ibn Qudama closes: the school does not diverge, the dog, the pig and their offshoot are impure, and what they touch besides the earth is washed seven times one of them with earth, from the licking or otherwise, an agreed hadith, Muslim specifying "the first with earth".
The Malikis hold the dog pure: the origin of things is purity, and life repels impurity as with every animal; its sweat, tears, mucus and saliva are pure, the saliva being pure outside the stomach, while what comes out of the stomach is impure, recognizable by its yellowish color and stench; the washing of the licked vessel is required as pure worship. Their proof:
So eat of what they catch for you.
Surah al-Ma'idah 4
no command to wash the touched spot, else the game would have been spoiled by its mouth; and the hadith of 'Adi ibn Hatim:
When you send your trained dog and it kills, eat.
narrated by al-Bukhari (173) and Muslim (1929)
The vessel is washed seven times as worship: the command is bound to a number, a sign that it is worship and not a mere removal of impurity, like wudu. Malik judges that if the dog licks food, the food is eaten and the vessel washed seven times, following the hadith, the command standing as a stern measure to keep away from their company. Is the washing obligatory or recommended? Two views in the school: obligation rests on the hadith's command, the command meaning obligation; the recommendation on its purity, the command being only a stern measure against acquiring them. The washing requires no fixed order either, seven washings without earth being able to suffice given the instability of the narrations; it is prescribed when the dog has licked water, and for other drinks and foods two narrations are reported. Ibn 'Abd al-Barr reports the state of Malikism of his time: the dog is pure, the vessel is washed seven times as worship, nothing is poured of what it licked except water alone given its low price, whoever has only that water performs wudu with it, and tayammum is not ordered to whoever holds water licked by a dog; yet he confesses: I do not know the exact reality of this hadith. Ibn al-Qasim, from Malik, judges that there is no good in what a dog licked and that performing wudu with it is disliked; Ibn Wahb reports from Malik the forbidding of wudu with licked water, the dog being harmful or harmless.
No divergence stands between the jurists: the skin of the carrion is impure before tanning. The divergence bears on the aftermath: does tanning purify it? Abu Hanifa judges that tanning purifies all skins, except the pig's, impure in itself, living as dead, its impurity coming not from its blood but from its essence; Abu Yusuf judges for his part the pig's skin purified. Al-Shafi'i: tanning purifies all skins of carrion, except those of the dog and the pig and their offshoot; a narration of Ahmad goes this way: what was pure in life gets purified. Ahmad in the famous, which is one of the two narrations of Malik, judges that no skin of carrion is purified by tanning; the other narration of Malik purifies all skins, including the dog's and the pig's, but the outer side only, for dry use, as a grain sack, not for the wet, water or butter. The argument of the camp of prohibition: the skin is part of the forbidden carrion:
Forbidden to you are the carrion and the blood.
Surah al-Ma'idah 3
it is therefore like the flesh, not purified; and dead, it is forbidden by death, so impure. Their proof is the hadith of Abdullah ibn 'Ukaym: the Prophet wrote to Juhayna:
I had granted you a concession regarding the skins of dead animals; when my letter reaches you, benefit no more from the carrion, neither by its skin nor by its sinews.
narrated by Abu Dawud (4127-4128), Ibn Majah (3613) and at-Tirmidhi (1719)
at-Tirmidhi grades it good but notes that most scholars do not act upon it; the letter, come one or two months before the Prophet's death, abrogates the earlier concession, for "I had granted you" attests the priority of the license and the last of the Messenger of Allah's commands prevails. The camp of purity relies on:
When the skin is tanned, it becomes pure.
narrated by Muslim (366)
and on the hadith of the dead sheep: the Prophet passed by a dead sheep given as charity to a freedman of Maymuna and said:
Why do you not benefit from its skin? They said: it is dead. He said: only its eating is forbidden. In a version: why did you not take its skin, tan it and benefit from it?
narrated by al-Bukhari (5531) and Muslim (363)
They answer further: the skin became impure by the contact of bloods and humors at the moment of death; tanning delivers it and brings it back to its living state.
The sheet opens with the hadith of Ibn Mas'ud:
The Prophet went to relieve himself and ordered me to bring him three pebbles; I found two and looked for the third without finding it; so I brought a dung; he took the two pebbles, threw the dung and said: this is riks.
narrated by al-Bukhari (155)
that is, impure. The scholars then diverge over the droppings and the urine of what one eats the flesh of. Malik and Ahmad in the famous declare them pure; Abu Hanifa: the dropping of the pigeon and the sparrow is pure, the rest impure; al-Shafi'i: impure without restriction; Zufar: pure, like Malik; al-Kasani: all droppings are impure with the generality of scholars; al-Nawawi: if they spread through affliction and precaution is impossible, one is excused and prayer remains valid, like the mud of streets and the dust of stables. The camp of purity invokes the practice of the young Companions who, at their dwellings and while traveling, threw dry dung at each other in play, and Malik recalls it served as fuel in Medina like firewood. The camp of impurity answers with the hadith of Ibn Mas'ud and with the presence of the meaning of impurity: the disgust of sound natures before a matter turned into stench, while one can guard against it.
Birds divide into two kinds. Those that do not soar in the air, hen and duck: their dropping is impure, by the disgust it provokes and its turning into a foul smell, like urine; of the goose, two narrations come from Abu Hanifa: Abu Yusuf reports it is not impure, al-Hasan that it is. Those that soar divide again: what one eats the flesh of, pigeon, sparrow, magpie, whose dropping is pure with the Hanafis and impure with al-Shafi'i, nature having turned it into corruption like the droppings; to which the Hanafis answer by the community's practice: pigeons were kept in the Sacred Mosque and the great mosques while knowing they relieved themselves there, with the command to purify the mosque:
Purify My house for those who circle around.
Surah al-Baqara 125
Ibn 'Umar wiped the spot where a dove had relieved itself on him and prayed, Ibn Mas'ud did the same for a sparrow; the mere transformation by nature therefore does not suffice for impurity without stench, and clothes and vessels cannot be protected from birds that relieve themselves in full flight: necessity prevails, as with the blood of the bedbug and the flea; Malik even reports the consensus on their purity. What one does not eat the flesh of, falcon, goshawk, kite: their dropping is pure with Abu Hanifa and Abu Yusuf, impure with a heavy impurity with Muhammad, nature having turned it into stench, with no necessity to ward off the impurity since they nest in meadows and deserts, unlike pigeons. The mouse's dropping is impure; as for the garment reached by its urine, a shaykh of Balkh said: if I were afflicted, I would wash; he was asked: and whoever does not wash and prays in it? He said: I do not order him to repeat. The bat's urine and dropping are not impure, since one cannot guard against them while it flies.
The Hanafis declare impure the beasts of prey, lion, leopard, wolf, monkey, as well as their su'r; the birds of prey, falcon, gerfalcon, kite, are impure too, but by legal preference their su'r is pure: their beak, dry, mixes no saliva, unlike the beasts that drink with the tongue wet with saliva; necessity and the general affliction plead further: they dive from heights to drink and none can protect his vessels, especially in the steppes; using them is nonetheless disliked, for mostly they feed on carrion. Abu Yusuf specifies: the su'r of what falls on carrions is impure; that of what eats slaughtered flesh is not disliked. The Malikis hold every living being pure, of every animal kind, and pure too what is generated from it. The Shafi'is: all animals and their su'r are pure, except the dog, the pig and their offshoot or the offshoot of either. The Hanbalis, through Ibn Qudama, divide animals into impure and pure: impure first those whose impurity comes from a single narration, dog, pig and their offshoot, in essence, su'r and all their moisture; then the divergent ones, the rest of the beasts of prey besides the cat and its kind, the birds of prey, the domestic donkey and the mule, whose su'r Ahmad judges impure, to the point of ordering tayammum to whoever has only it; pure at last three kinds: the human, pure with pure su'r, Muslim or disbeliever by the generality of scholars; what one eats the flesh of, Abu Bakr Ibn al-Mundhir reporting the consensus on the lawfulness of drinking its su'r and performing wudu with it; and the cat and its kind with the insects of the earth, whose su'r may be drunk and used for wudu, the view of most scholars. Ibn Hubayra synthesizes: an agreement on the pure and purifying su'r of the edible beasts; divergence over that of the non-edible fierce ones, lion, tiger: Abu Hanifa and Ahmad in one narration declare it impure, Malik, al-Shafi'i and Ahmad in the other declare it pure, Malik excepting the carrion eaters, with impure su'r. The su'r of the mule and the donkey carries the agreement, pure and purifying, except Abu Hanifa who doubts its purifying quality; Ibn Jarir reports from Malik the dislike, and Ahmad diverges: one narration of doubt with Abu Hanifa, wudu with it when needed if no other water exists, tayammum added, and no wudu with it if he finds other water, another narration of impurity, which his companions supported.
Sheet 21 deals with removing impurity by other than water. Abu Hanifa and Abu Yusuf, a narration in the Maliki school, and in the Hanbali school the choice of Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyya, judge it lawful to purify with other than water: vinegar, rose water and the like, not oil nor broth, matters that get squeezed once squeezed; for these liquids remove by nature, so they must confer purity like water, and more: it is known by necessity that every liquid removes each time a part of the impurity, whose color changes the water, and the impurity is finite, made of finite substances: when its parts end, the place remains pure. Al-Shafi'i, the second view in the school of Malik and in that of Ahmad, judges that impurity is purified only with water. Ahmad has a third view: lawfulness by necessity, like the purity of the cat's mouth by its saliva and that of infants. The sheet adds: removing impurity belongs to the category of avoidances and not of commanded acts, its aim being to avoid filth; no act of the servant nor intention is required: if rain from the sky removes it, the aim is reached; but whoever removes it by his act and intention is rewarded, without reward or punishment otherwise. The last Hanbali narrations cited at the head of the sheet finally restrict the number of washings to impurities outside the body, and drop it for everything that is neither dog nor pig, narrations that the critic al-Khallal, Abu Bakr ibn 'Abd al-'Aziz, rejects by pointing out the weakness of their transmitter.
Shafi'is and Hanbalis: if an impurity reaches the bottom of the khuff or of the sandal, its purification is done by washing; rubbing it like the garment and the body does not suffice, wet or dry; among the Shafi'is, two views on excusing the dry rubbed impurity. Al-Nawawi details: a wet impurity of the khuff's bottom rubbed on the ground so as to remove its substance while leaving the trace does not suffice, and prayer in it is not valid without divergence, for it spreads; if it dried then was rubbed without spreading, the khuff is impure without divergence, but prayer with that excused impurity carries two views, the more correct of the later ones being invalidity, Ahmad thus in the most correct narrations, for it is an impure worn garment, where wiping does not avail as for the cloth. The old view, the more correct according to the hadith of Abu Sa'id al-Khudri:
If one of you goes to the mosque, let him look at his sandals; if he sees in them a filth, or harm as he said, let him rub them then pray in them.
authentic hadith narrated by Abu Dawud (650), Ahmad (11895), Ibn Khuzayma (786) and Ibn Hibban (2185)
Ar-Rafi'i conditions the excuse on three things: that the impurity have a body sticking to the khuff, urine and the like never yielding to rubbing; that the rubbing occur in the dry state, the wet state never sufficing; that the impurity come from walking, unintended, for staining it on purpose imposes washing. Al-Bahuti reports from al-Insaf that the small impurity remaining at the bottom of the khuff and the shoe after rubbing is excused, on the view of its impurity. Abu Hanifa judges that an impurity with a body, dung or excrement, once dried, may be rubbed on the ground; the wet one and the one without body, khamr or urine, admit only washing. Abu Yusuf allows rubbing dry and wet, except urine and khamr; Muhammad admits only washing, as for the garment; Ibn Nujaym notes the hadith is a proof against him and that his retraction is reported. Abu Yusuf relies on the generality of the Prophet's hadith, without distinction between wet and dry nor between embodied and bodiless, and on the general necessity; al-Kamal ibn al-Humam observes that most shaykhs are on Abu Yusuf's view, chosen given the general affliction, the distance between the mosque and the house being too short for the khuff to get wet during the time it takes to cover it. The Malikis distinguish the dungs and urines of pack beasts from the rest of impurities: reached by a beast's dung or urine, the khuff is excused if rubbed with earth, a stone or the like until the substance disappears, likewise if the impurity dried leaving nothing but what the sandal produces while walking; some restrict the excuse to places beasts frequent much, the roads, given the hardship of precaution; elsewhere, even rubbed, no excuse. The other impurities, dog's excrement, human filth or blood beyond the dirham, impose washing; al-Hattab, citing Ibn al-'Arabi, gives the cause: the rarity of such matters on the roads, which, were they to multiply there, would become like the dungs of beasts.
Sheet 23 opens with the question asked to Umm Salama, wife of the Prophet:
A woman said: I am a woman who trails her garment long and walks in dirty places. Umm Salama reports that the Prophet said: what follows her purifies it.
authentic hadith narrated by Abu Dawud (383), at-Tirmidhi (143) and Ibn Majah (506)
Abu Bakr Ibn al-Mundhir reports the divergence over its meaning. Ahmad: the meaning is not that what touches the hem of urine then passes on the ground gets purified by it, but that she who passes on a dirty place then passes on a purer place and purifies this one of that one: the earth purifies a part of it by another, with nothing reaching it. Malik understands the same: stepping on the dirty earth then on the dry clean earth, each purifying the other; as for the wet impurity, urine or other, reaching the garment or a part of the body so as to wet it, only washing purifies it, and this is the imams' consensus. Al-Shafi'i: "what follows her" holds only for what is dragged over dryness leaving nothing sticking to it; dragged over wetness, only washing purifies, even had the smell, the color and the trace vanished. The Malikis finally restrict the excuse for what the hem receives of dryness to three conditions: that the hem be dry and trailed for modesty, not for adornment and pride; ad-Dasuqi specifies one trails for modesty only when wearing neither khuff nor sock: whoever wears them has no excuse, adornment or not; that the impurity be light and dry, the wet one imposing washing, unless it is of those excused, like mud; and that the place stepped on after the contact be pure and dry.
In daily life, keep in mind: a vessel licked by a dog is washed seven times one of them with earth, three with the Hanafis, and with the Malikis nothing is poured except water alone; a tanned skin is pure for some, never for others, and doubt invites abstention; dungs and urines of beasts on the shoes of busy paths are excused once rubbed with the Malikis; the hem trailed over dry pure ground purifies itself according to Umm Salama's hadith; and whatever the eye does not grasp is excused, so long as one can guard against it without hardship.