PROHIBITIONS IN PERFORMING AN ABLUTION

There are twelve prohibitions in performing an ablution. Doing them is either haram [1] or makruh [2]; they are as follows:

1 - When relieving oneself or urinating in the toilet or out-doors, one should not turn one’s front or back towards the qibla [3].
2 - It is haram (prohibited) to open one’s private parts near someone in order to make taharat.
3 - One should not make taharat with one’s right hand.
4 - When there is no water, it is makruh to make taharat (to clean oneself) with food products, manure, bones, animals’ food, coal, someone else’s property, a piece of flowerpot or tile, reeds, leaves, a piece of cloth or paper.
5 - One must not spit or throw mucus into the pool where one makes an ablution.
6 - One should not wash one’s limbs of ablution much more or less than the prescribed limit, nor wash them more or less than three times.
7 - One must not wipe one’s limbs of ablution with the same cloth used for taharat.
8 - While washing the face, one must not splash the water on one’s face, but pour it from the upper forehead downwards.
9 - One must not blow on or over the surface of the water.
10 - One must not close one’s mouth and eyes tightly. If even a tiny part of the outward part of the lips or the eyelids is left dry, the ablution will not be acceptable.
11 - One must not expell mucus from one’s nose with one’s right hand.
12 - One must not make masah on one’s head, ears or neck more than once after moistening the hands each time.

GLOSSARY

[1] Haram: an action, word or thought prohibited by Allahu ta’ala.
[2] makruh: (act, thing) improper, disliked and abstained by the Prophet (‘alaihi ‘s-salam); makruh tahrima: prohibited with much stress.
[3] qibla: direction towards the Ka’ba. The direction turned towards during worshipping (in Islam, toward the Ka’ba).