During the caliphate of ʿUthmān, when the people had become numerous, ʿUthmān ordered the third adhān on Friday, and it was called from al-Zawrāʾ. The practice remained established upon that.¹

1088 — Al-Nufaylī narrated to us, Muḥammad ibn Salamah narrated to us, from Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq, from al-Zuhrī, from al-Sāʾib ibn Yazīd, who said: The adhān used to be given before the Messenger of Allah — peace be upon him — when he sat upon the minbar on Friday, at the door of the mosque, and likewise during the time of Abū Bakr and ʿUmar. Then he continued with a narration similar to that of Yūnus.²

---

¹ Its chain of transmission is authentic. Ibn Shihāb: he is Muḥammad ibn Muslim ibn ʿUbayd Allāh ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Zuhrī, and Yūnus: he is Ibn Yazīd al-Aylī, and Ibn Wahb: he is ʿAbd Allāh. It was also recorded by al-Bukhārī (912), (913), (915), and (916), al-Tirmidhī (523), and al-Nasāʾī in al-Kubrā (1712) through various routes from al-Zuhrī. It is also in Musnad Aḥmad (15716) and Ṣaḥīḥ Ibn Ḥibbān (1673). See also what follows under numbers (1088–1090). Al-Qasṭallānī said in Sharḥ al-Bukhārī: The call that ʿUthmān added was at the entry of the time [of prayer], and it was in a place distant from the mosque such that the adhān performed inside the Prophet's Mosque could not be heard. Its purpose was to inform the greatest number of Muslims so that they might hasten to the remembrance of Allah. Nowadays, loudspeakers suffice in place of this adhān. He called it "third" because it was an addition to the adhān before the imam and the iqāmah for prayer, and the iqāmah was called an adhān by way of predominance, given the shared element of notification in both. This adhān was [introduced] when the Muslims had become numerous, and ʿUthmān added it by way of his own ijtihād, with the rest of the Companions agreeing through their silence and lack of disapproval, thus becoming a tacit consensus. Al-Zawrāʾ is a place in the market of Medina.

² Its chain of transmission is ḥasan on account of Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq — he being Ibn Yasār al-Muṭṭalibī, their freed slave — and he explicitly stated that he was narrating by hearing in Aḥmad (15716) and others, thus removing any suspicion of tadlīs. Moreover, he is corroborated. Al-Nufaylī: he is ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī ibn Nufayl.