Question
Reference number: 551750 | Prayers | May 23, 2019
When I want to make up a prayer, how shall I do that? Which prayer should be performed first, the one that I missed or the other one which time is due?
Answer
Praise Be to Allah and Peace Be Upon His Messenger.
Originally, performing prayers in order is required. In other words, Al-Fajr Prayer should be performed before the Dhuhr Prayer which should be performed before the Asr Prayer and so on. Once a Muslim has to make up a prayer, they should follow this order. However, there are certain situations in which the order should not be taken into consideration. That is, the prayer which time is due should be performed before making the missed one up.
When one misses the Dhuhr Prayer, for example, and goes to the mosque to make it up and pray the Asr Prayer, but he finds that the congregational prayer is about to start, he can perform the Asr Prayer first, to be able to pray in a congregation and get the full reward, and then, he makes the Dhuhr Prayer up.
Furthermore, if one misses the Dhuhr Prayer because of a long sleep, then they wake up after the Asr Prayer when there is no enough time to pray Dhuhr then Asr, they can pray the Asr Prayer first, and then make the Dhuhr Prayer up.
However, if a Muslim misses the Dhuhr Prayer, then the Asr Prayer is due, there is plenty of time to pray Asr, he is not in a mosque and he wants to pray individually, he should pray in order: he should make up the Dhuhr Prayer and then pray the Asr Prayer.