Assalamo alaikom,

What can we do about the Jumua prayer in the USA? As we know, in the USA, Friday is a business day, masajid (mosques) are not everywhere as they are overseas, the time of Jumua is around 2pm, meaning that after 4-5 hours of work and up to two hours driving, it is a time of relaxation when the ability to focus on a long lecture is very poor and, before all of that, the Sunnah of the prophet, Mohamed (pbuh), is a short khutba (sermon) and a long beautiful prayer. (How long does it take to read Surat Kaaf?) We have imams here in central Florida who spend 40 minutes to one hour on the khutba. I, like many others, express the hardship of having a long Jumua prayer. One of the imams was very fair, saying that I am not a scholar to confirm that 30 minutes or more before the Jumua prayer is a hardship on the Muslims in doing their mandatory acts of worship, so we decided to get the opinion of scholars in the USA. I really wish to have an open discussion with one of our scholars, with the goal of establishing a quick guide for the imams based on our Sharia and daily life in America.

Please advise.

Salam,

Mohamed Mellouli

One possible solution for those who spend more than half an hour driving to reach the nearest masjid to their place of work might be to establish the Friday prayer in their area by designating a small room in their office as a musulla (prayer room), gathering a minimum of three people, having the most qualified and knowledgeable person amongst them deliver a khutba, and then performing the salah (prayer) afterwards.