» Making up for lost prayers.

From my younger days, I have not prayed. At the age of 49 years, I started to pray and now it has already been three years, since I started praying. For those years which I have not prayed, how can i offer Qadha?

Wassalaam

Answer

First of all, you must be congratulated for inclining towards offering your prayers and servitude towards the Lord of the Worlds. May the Almighty guide us all to the path of His liking, before our opportunity of doing so, ceases.

The situation that you have explained is quite similar to a case of effective conversion to Islam.It happens to many of us. Dear brother,this is beginning of a new life. A life of being grateful to our creator through submitting to His commandments.

The question you have asked has not been discussed either in the Quran or Hadith therefore an Ijtehad is required to deal with this issue. Scholars have suggested following three options. You can choose any of the three;

A person must offer all of the lost prayers as soon as he realizes their importance and significance. A possible method of doing so may be to offer each of the five daily prayers twice (only the fardh rak’ahs), once to fulfill the present obligation and the second time as a recompense for one of the lost prayers of the past;
A person should regularly offer his present obligatory prayers and should try to offer as many supererogatory (naf’l) rak’ahs as may be possible for him. It may be hoped that God shall accept our supererogatory rak’ahs and shall accept them as a recompense for our missed prayers of the past;
Prayers intentionally missed are lost forever and, therefore, cannot be offered after their prescribed time. Thus, a person has no other option, except to repent and ask for God’s forgiveness for all the prayers that he has intentionally missed in the past.

We are inclined towards suggesting a combination of point number 2 and 3. We suggest that you should pray your regular obligatory prayers, offer supererogatory (naf’l) rak’ahs regularly, as much as possible, and seek God’s forgiveness for your past. It may be hoped that your supererogatory prayers and your consistently seeking God’s forgiveness , shall insha’Allah, be a source of complete forgiveness and infinite blessings for you in the hereafter.

Hope this helps

Allah knows the best

UIUK