تشريع الأذان

The adhan — the Islamic call to prayer — was instituted in Medina in the first year after the Hijra through a mechanism that combined community deliberation, divine communication through a dream, and prophetic recognition. The Muslim community needed a way to gather for the five daily prayers. Various methods were proposed and rejected: a horn (associated with Jewish practice), a bell (associated with Christian practice), a fire. None satisfied the Prophet ﷺ. The resolution came when Abdullah ibn Zayd ibn Abd Rabbih al-Ansari came to the Prophet ﷺ with a vision he had seen at night: a man in green garments carrying a bell, from whom Abdullah asked to purchase it for the call to prayer. The man said: 'Shall I not tell you something better than that?' And he proceeded to recite the words of the adhan. The Prophet ﷺ recognized the vision as true and told Abdullah: 'Teach these words to Bilal and have him call the people, for his voice is more resonant than yours.' Umar ibn al-Khattab arrived shortly after, having seen the same vision the same night. 'Allah is to be praised,' said the Prophet ﷺ. Bilal ibn Rabah — the Abyssinian freed slave who had endured torture in Mecca for saying 'Ahad, Ahad' — became the first muadhdhin in Islam. The selection of Bilal was itself a statement: the man who had owned nothing and whose body bore the marks of what the Quraysh had done to him for his faith now carried the voice that called the Muslim world to prayer. The adhan's words — Allahu Akbar, the two testimonies of faith, hayya 'ala al-salah (come to prayer), hayya 'ala al-falah (come to success), and the final declarations — constitute a complete theological statement in approximately forty words. They have been called five times daily, in the same Arabic, since Bilal's first call in Medina, in every Muslim community the world has known. The call hayya 'ala al-falah — come to success — defines prayer not as an interruption of productive life but as what productive life is ultimately for. The adhan is the first sound whispered into a newborn Muslim's ear and among the last many Muslims hear as they die.