Prophets Dāwūd and Sulaymān: Part 1 — A Kingdom Like No Other
Section 11 of 25 · Lives of the Prophets
The Horses and the Missed Prayer
Allah (swt) tested Sulaymān (peace be upon him) with some tests.
وَوَهَبْنَا لِدَاوُۥدَ سُلَيْمَـٰنَ ۚ نِعْمَ ٱلْعَبْدُ ۖ إِنَّهُۥٓ أَوَّابٌ إِذْ عُرِضَ عَلَيْهِ بِٱلْعَشِىِّ ٱلصَّـٰفِنَـٰتُ ٱلْجِيَادُ
“And We blessed Dawūd with Sulaimān. He was an excellent servant (of Allah). Surely, he was great in turning (to Us, in penitence and praise). (Worth remembering is the incident) when the swift horses of high breeding were presented before him in the evening.” (38:30–31)
Idh ʿuriḍa ʿalayhi bil-ʿashiyyi al-ṣāfinātu al-jiyād — Allah (swt) says: when there were displayed before him, in the afternoon, well-trained horses of the highest breed. This was like an army parade in front of Sulaymān, to show his army; so they were marching the horses in front of him, and he was inspecting the horses.
فَقَالَ إِنِّىٓ أَحْبَبْتُ حُبَّ ٱلْخَيْرِ عَن ذِكْرِ رَبِّى حَتَّىٰ تَوَارَتْ بِٱلْحِجَابِ رُدُّوهَا عَلَىَّ ۖ فَطَفِقَ مَسْحًۢا بِٱلسُّوقِ وَٱلْأَعْنَاقِ
“He said, “I held the love of the good things (i.e. these horses) because of the remembrance of my Lord.” until it went behind the veil. (Then he said,) “Bring them back to me” - and he started passing his hands over the shanks and the necks (of the horses).” (38:32–33)
When he was inspecting the horses, he got busy with that, and the time of ṣalāh passed, and he missed the ṣalāh. And he said: alas, I did love the good instead of remembering my Lord — in his ʿAṣr prayer, this is in parenthesis — till the time was over and the sun had hidden in the veil of night. Sulaymān was inspecting these horses, and the time of Maghrib came before he prayed ʿAṣr; so he missed ʿAṣr. The next ayah says: then he said, bring these horses back to me — and he began to pass his hand over their legs and their necks.
There are two opinions given in the tafsīr of this ayah, and both of them are nothing more than opinions; there is no strong hadith or evidence that either one of them is right — or maybe both of them could be wrong. The two opinions are: one of them is that Sulaymān passed his hands over the horses as an honouring for these horses of jihad. The other opinion is that Sulaymān was upset because the horses were the cause of distracting him from ṣalāh, so he cut off their necks and killed them. Ibn Jarīr al-Ṭabarī refuses to accept the second opinion, because he says: how come Sulaymān would blame the horses, who are innocent, for this? So there is no way to choose either one of the opinions. And then the first opinion — what does it mean by passing his hand over them?
But the lesson that we learn from the ayah is clear — and first of all we believe in the ayat of Allah (swt) — and the lesson is clear: that Allah (swt) was testing him. And this test did also happen to the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him). In one of the battles, the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was busy with fighting, and they missed the ṣalāh, and the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) says: qātalahumu Allāh, shaghalūnā ʿan al-ṣalāh — may Allah fight them; they have distracted us from ṣalāh. And the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) could not pray until the sun had already set.
Some of the ʿulamāʾ derive a ḥukm from this: that if the battleground allows you to pray ṣalāt al-khawf, then pray ṣalāt al-khawf; but in case the fighting is so vicious and tough that you are not even able to pray ṣalāt al-khawf, then you can delay it and pray it when the battle is over. This is a ḥukm that some of the ʿulamāʾ derived from this hadith.