Further Occasions of Mustaḥabb Ghusl

A number of further occasions carry this same recommendation, each with its own religious significance behind it. Reaching the age of puberty without any of its usual physical signs having yet appeared — fifteen years old, by the Ḥanafī reckoning, being the official age at which a person becomes mukallaf, religiously responsible and answerable for themselves, not unlike the way the bar mitzvah marks a coming of age among the Jews, a becoming of a man or a woman in the eyes of the religion — is one such occasion, and children may well be encouraged toward it as that age approaches. Recovering one's senses after a fainting spell, a nervous breakdown, or any other genuine loss of them — including through the effect of a drug such as ice, once sobriety and full awareness return afterwards — is another such occasion; and the person who has personally washed a deceased body is likewise recommended to make ghusl afterwards, given everything that is inevitably splashed onto them in the course of that work, however carefully wrapped and protected they were while doing it.

Ghusl is also mustaḥabb on Laylat al-Barāʾah, the fifteenth night of Shaʿbān, and again on Laylat al-Qadr. It is mustaḥabb on entering al-Madīnah al-Munawwarah, whether travelling there for Ḥajj, for ʿUmrah, or simply for ziyārah to visit the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) — ghusl is made before entering the city itself. It is mustaḥabb before ṭawāf al-ziyārah or ṭawāf al-ifāḍah, and it is likewise recommended before rami, the stoning of the jamarāt, during Ḥajj. Each of these carries its own religious weight, and the recommendation to make ghusl beforehand reflects that weight directly.