(O ye who believe! Draw not near unto prayer when ye are drunken…) [4:43]. This was revealed about some people who were Companions of the Messenger of Allah, Allah bless him and give him peace. They were in the habit of drinking wine and then going to pray while still drunk. Because of this they did not know how many units of prayer they performed or what they said in their prayers. Abu Bakr al-Asfahani informed us> Abu’l-Shaykh al-Hafiz> Abu Yahya> Sahl Ibn ‘Uthman> Abu ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Afriqi> ‘Ata’> Abu ‘Abd al-Rahman who said: “One day, ‘Abd al-Rahman ibn ‘Awf prepared food and invited some Companions of the Prophet, Allah bless him and give him peace. They ate and drank and when the time for the Maghrib prayer was due they stood up to pray. One of them stepped forward to lead the prayer. He recited (Say: O disbelievers…) [Surah 109] but did not recite correctly, and so Allah, exalted is He, revealed (O ye who believe! Draw not near unto prayer when ye are drunken, till ye know that which ye utter…)”. (…and if ye find not water, then go to high clean soil…) [4:43]. Abu ‘Abd Allah ibn Abi Ishaq informed us> Abu ‘Amr ibn Matar> Ibrahim ibn ‘Ali al-Dhuhli> Yahya ibn Yahya> Malik ibn Anas> ‘Abd al-Rahman ibn al-Qasim> his father> ‘A’ishah who said: “We travelled with the Messenger of Allah, Allah bless him and give him peace, in one of his travels and when we reached al-Bayda’ or Dhat al-Jaysh I dropped my necklace and so the Messenger of Allah, Allah bless him and give peace, set camp to look for it and people camped with him too, except that that area did not have water and they did not carry water with them either. So people went to Abu Bakr and said: ‘Did you see what ‘A’ishah has done? She made the Messenger of Allah, Allah bless him and give him peace, camp along with people when they have no water with them and this area does not have any water?’ And so Abu Bakr came. He found the Messenger of Allah, Allah bless him and give him peace, sleeping with his head on my thigh. He said: ‘You have held back the Messenger of Allah and people with him when this area has no water and people have no water with them either’.
Asbab Al-Nuzul by Al-Wahidi , trans. Mokrane Guezzou
