The five daily prayers are a pillar of Islam and the first thing that a person will be asked about on the Day of Judgement. Allah says that prayer is obligatory upon the believers at fixed times (4:103). The Prophet ﷺ said that Islam is built on five, and prayer is one of them.
Each is an individual obligation on every sane, adult Muslim, man or woman, except a woman who is in her period or postnatal bleeding.
The obligation applies in illness, travel and fear, in a shortened or adapted form, and it is not dropped.
2Why it matters
The Prophet ﷺ compared the five prayers to a river at the door of a person who bathes in it five times a day: nothing of the dirt would remain. In the same way the prayers wipe away sins.
He said that the deed most loved by Allah is the prayer at its fixed time.
Allah says: establish prayer for My remembrance (20:14).
3Who is not required
A child below the age of discernment. Children are told to pray from seven years and are corrected at ten, as it is reported.
A person who has lost their mind, until they recover.
Where the schools differ
The four Sunni schools agree on the main ruling above and differ in these points. No school is preferred here.
Abandoning the prayer out of laziness while believing it is obligatory: the Maliki and Shafi'i schools say the person is a sinner, and is to be punished by the ruler, while the Hanbali school holds him to be a disbeliever, and the Hanafi school says he is to be imprisoned. All schools agree it is a grave sin.
Намозни адо этганингиздан сўнг Аллоҳни турган, ўтирган ва ёнбошлаган ҳолингизда эсланг. Хотиржам бўлганингизда намозни тўлиқ адо этинг. Албатта, намоз мўминларга вақтида фарз қилингандир. (Xар вақтда ҳам, ҳар намоздан кейин ҳам Аллоҳни зикир этиш тарғиб қилинади. Аммо бу ояти каримада бу иш ҳавф намозидан кейин, айниқса, зарур экани таъкидланмоқда. Ўтирганда ҳам, турганда ҳам, ёнбошлаганда ҳам, яъни, ҳамма ҳолатларда Аллоҳ таолони зикр қилиб, ундан душман билан бўладиган жангда ғалаба-нусрат сўралади.)
The point of the hadith: The five prayers are like a river at a door in which a person bathes five times a day: no dirt would remain on him. In the same way they wipe away sins.
This is general information, not a fatwa. For your own situation, ask a qualified scholar.
Fiqh questions
The five daily prayers: why they are obligatory and their place in Islam
The five daily prayers are a pillar of Islam and the first thing that a person will be asked about on the Day of Judgement. Allah says that prayer is obligatory upon the believers at fixed times (4:103). The Prophet ﷺ said that Islam is built on five, and prayer is one of them.
Is this a fatwa?
No. It is a summary of well-known rulings with their evidence. For your own case, ask a qualified scholar.
What if my school differs from this answer?
Follow the view of the school you follow and the scholar who teaches you. The page lists the differences of the four schools.
