Friday prayer

[4] The service consists of several parts including ritual washing, chants, recitation of scripture and prayer, and sermons.

The service consists of several parts including ritual washing, chants, recitation of scripture and prayer, and sermons.

[8] The imam performs the following: According to the majority of Shiite and Sunni doctrine, the sermon must contain praise and glorification of Allah, invoke blessings on Muhammad and his progeny, and have a short quotation from the Quran in Arabic called a surah.

[16] Shia and Sunni sects of Islam prescribe slight differences in this pattern but the following is a general outline of the steps of the prayer cycle.

[17] According to Shi'ite doctrine, two qunut (raising one's hands for supplication during salat) is especially recommended during salatul Jum'ah.

[21] There is consensus among Muslims regarding the Friday prayer (salat al-jum'ah) being wajib – required – in accordance with the Quranic verse, as well as the many traditions narrated both by Shi'i and Sunni sources.

[25] Moreover, it has been stated that Jum'ah is not obligatory for old men, children, women, slaves, travellers, the sick, blind and disabled, as well as those who are outside the limit of two farsakhs.

And when the prayer is finished, disperse through the land and seek God's grace, and remember God greatly so that you may be successful.Narrated Abu Huraira: Muhammad said, "On every Friday the angels take their stand at every gate of the mosques to write the names of the people chronologically (i.e. according to the time of their arrival for the Friday prayer) and when the Imam sits (on the pulpit) they fold up their scrolls and get ready to listen to the sermon.

Aws ibn Aws, narrated that Muhammad said: "Whoever performs Ghusl on Friday and causes (his wife) to do ghusl, then goes early to the mosque and attends from the beginning of the Khutbah and draws near to the Imam and listens to him attentively, Allah will give him the full reward of fasting all the days of a year and observing night-vigil on each of its nights for every step that he took towards the mosque."

It is also recommended by Shiite Scholars to attend Jum'ah as it will become Wajib after the appearance of Imam al-Mahdi and Jesus Christ (Isa).

[38][39] According to them, communal Friday prayers with a sermon were wrong and had lapsed (along with several other religious practices) until the return of their 12th Imam, Muhammad al-Mahdi.

When al-Sadr installed Friday prayer imams in Shia-majority areas—a practice not traditional in Iraqi Shiism and considered "revolutionary, if not heretical"[39]—it put him at odds with the Shia religious establishment in Najaf.

These numbers are stable from the same survey conducted in 2006,[42] where 64.5% of Indonesians attended religious services at least once a week (including 56.0% of the population under 30 and 64.3% of men).

[citation needed] The number of regular attendees is somewhat lower in the next largest Muslim-majority country, Pakistan, which has over 210 million Muslims making up over 95% of the population.

[citation needed] A different pattern is seen in the Muslim-majority country of Bangladesh (which has over 150 million Muslims making up over 90% of the population).

Similarly, According to a 2012 survey by Pew Research Center, 19% of Turkish Muslims say that they attend Friday prayer once a week and 23% say they never visit their local mosque.

According to a 2012 survey by Pew Research Center, about 1% of the Muslims in Azerbaijan, 5% in Albania, 9% in Uzbekistan, 10% in Kazakhstan, 19% in Russia and 22% in Kosovo said that they attend mosque once a week or more.

[43] This was largely due to the religious restriction of Islam under communist rule, and attendance levels have been rising rapidly since the fall of the Soviet Union.

[43] Sub-Saharan African Muslim communities tend to have a high rates of mosque attendance, and ranges from 65% in Senegal to nearly 100% in Ghana.

[43] In South Asia, home to the largest Muslim communities in the world,[44] mosque attendance at least once a week ranges from 53% in Bangladesh to 61% in Afghanistan.

[43] Surveys conducted in 1994 and in 1996 observed a decrease in religiosity among Muslims in Belgium based on lowering mosque participation, less frequent prayer, dropping importance attached to a religious education, etc.