Rereading Examples of “What Is Prostrated on” in Imami Traditions

The phrase “mā yusjadu ‘alayh,” meaning “what is permissible for prostration”, allocates an important part of the chapters of sujūd (prostration) in the Imāmī narrative collections and jurisprudential books. Imāmī scholars then went to explain the rule of “mā yusjadu ‘alayh” and determine some of its conventional examples. The examples of “the earth and everything that comes from it, that is neither edible nor wearable” taken from only a few Imāmī narrations in the chapters of prostration, have been considered and nearly become popular for scholars as a rule to determine the examples of “mā yusjadu ‘alayh”. Based on the analytical descriptive method, this study seeks to detect another examples of the phrase. Through fiq al-hadith ways, it proves that some of the Imāmī neglected traditions may also inspire a rule in this field. According to this rule, named as “uwthān (idols) rule” by this research, “prostrating on the worldly deities and anything that is suspected of worshiping other than God is not permissible.” In this case, the phrase of “the earth and everything that comes from it” in the traditions is only served as explaining some examples of the latter rule. Additionally, based on this rule, the conflicts of a large number of narrations of “mā yusjadu ‘alayh” chapters will be resolved with no need for methods such as taqīyah, itlāq, taqyīd, etc.