He would not prostrate until he had straightened himself standing, and when he raised his head from prostration he would not prostrate again until he had sat upright. He would say in every two rakʿahs: "al-Taḥiyyāt," and when he sat he would spread his left foot and set upright his right foot.¹ He forbade the squatting of the devil and the spreading of the beast.² He would conclude the prayer with the taslīm, peace be upon him.³

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¹ In (A), (B), and (E): "he would spread his left foot, his right foot"; the established reading is from (C).

² Its chain is sound. Ḥusayn al-Muʿallim: he is Ibn Dhakwān, and Abū al-Jawzāʾ: he is Aws ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Rabʿī.

It was also recorded by Muslim (498), Ibn Mājah (812), (869), and (893) via Ḥusayn al-Muʿallim, with this chain. The versions of Ibn Mājah are abridged.

It is in the Musnad of Aḥmad (24030) and (24791), and in Ṣaḥīḥ Ibn Ḥibbān (1768).

His saying: "he did not raise his head nor lower it" means: he did not lift it nor tilt it down, but rather between the two, such that his back and neck were level.

His saying: "he forbade the squatting of the devil" — Imam al-Nawawī said in Sharḥ Muslim 3/19, commenting on the ḥadīth of Ibn ʿAbbās which mentions the sunnah of sitting on the heels (al-iqʿāʾ) and that it is a sunnah from the Prophet ﷺ: The correct view, from which there is no turning away, is that al-iqʿāʾ is of two types:

One: that he affixes his buttocks to the ground, raises his shins, and places his hands on the ground like the squatting of a dog. This is how Abū ʿUbaydah and his companion Abū ʿUbayd al-Qāsim ibn Sallām and others among the scholars of language explained it. This type is the disliked one concerning which the prohibition came.

The second type: that he places his buttocks on his heels between the two prostrations. This is what Ibn ʿAbbās meant by his saying: "the sunnah of your Prophet." Al-Shāfiʿī explicitly stated in al-Buwayṭī and al-Imlāʾ that it is recommended in the sitting between the two prostrations, and a group of verifiers interpreted the ḥadīth of Ibn ʿAbbās accordingly, among them al-Bayhaqī, Qāḍī ʿIyāḍ, and others.

"And the spreading of the beast" — al-Khaṭṭābī said: it is that he spreads his hands and forearms in prostration, extending them on the ground like a beast. Rather, the sunnah is to place his palms on the ground, raise his forearms, and keep his elbows away from his sides.