Answer
Wa `alaykum As-Salamu waRahmatullahi wa Barakatuh.
In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
All praise and thanks are due to Allah, and peace and blessings be upon His Messenger.
In this fatwa:
A Muslim who suffers from incontinence has to wait until the time of the Prayer begins and then starts to remove ritual impurity from his body and clothes. Then he starts to make wudu and perform the Prayer.
Responding to your question, Dr. Muhammad Salama, PhD in Islamic Studies in English and an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Islamic Science, Al-Madinah International University, states:
I earnestly pray to Allah, the All-Merciful, to grant you quick recovery.
The Islamic Shari`ah is intrinsically easy and never lays burdens on people. In cases of hardship and suffering, Shari`ah concessions and licenses always arise.
A Muslim who suffers from incontinence has to wait until the time of the Prayer begins and then starts to remove najasah (ritual impurity) from his body and clothes, if possible.
He needs also to use something like a diaper in order to contain the spread of the impurity. Any impurity discharged, thereafter, will be pardonable. Then he starts to make ablution and perform the Prayer.
Moreover, in extreme cases of incontinence when it is hard to do these steps five times for each prayer, one may combine Zhuhr and Asr together at the time of any of them and Maghrib and Isha together at the time of any of them, according to the Hanbalites. This will reduce the number to 3 times only.
Allah Almighty knows best.
Editor’s note: This fatwa is from Ask the Scholar’s archive and was originally published at an earlier date.