If a person who intends to perform his missed (qada) prayers dies, will his missed prayers be forgiven?

- A Muslim starts to perform his missed (qada) prayers by intending to perform all of them. He performs them regularly based on a plan as he lives. If he dies before performing all of his missed prayers, will Allah accept it as if he has performed all missed prayers or will he be regarded in debt since he has not performed all of them?

Dear Brother / Sister,

Every believer must act very sensitively about prayer and perform his prayers on time; if he has missed a prayer, he must definitely perform it as qada.

If a person skips one day fasting in Ramadan, it is fard for him to perform that fasting as qada; the same thing is valid for prayers because prayer is an obligation that every Muslim has to fulfill.

It is a mistake for a person not to pay his debt on time but he has to pay it even if it is late and has to apologize to his creditor.

Similarly, if a believer has not performed “the prescribed prayers, which are an innate duty and the basis of worship and an incontestable debt”, he must regret and perform them as qada; in addition, he must repent of missing them.

Yes, the debt of prayer can be paid only through performing prayers. There is no other way of paying it. If a person skips the morning prayer and feeds one thousand poor people instead; this generosity cannot replace the morning prayer. 

Suppose that a believer did not perform prayers until he was forty years old. Then, he regretted and started to perform prayers. He intended to perform one day of missed prayers every day and performed them like that for ten years without skipping any of them. Suppose that he died before he finished performing his missed prayers. We hope Allah Almighty, who has infinite mercy, will forgive him for his remaining missed prayers because if Allah had allowed him to live longer, he would have performed all of his missed prayers.

Allah Almighty states the following in a scared hadith:

“I will treat My slave in the way as he knows Me.” (Bukhari, Tawhid, 15)

The Messenger of Allah (pbuh) gives the following glad tiding:

“Deeds are based on intentions.” (Bukhari, Badul-Wahy, 1; Muslim, Imarah, 155)

Another hadith is as follows:

“Allah addresses His angels as follows: If My slave intends to fulfill a good deed but cannot do it, record as if he did a full good deed in return for this good intention.” (see Bukhari, Riqaq 31; Muslim, Iman 207, 259)

Thus, if a person repents sincerely and starts to perform his missed prayer with the intention of finishing all of them, and if he dies before finishing them, Allah Almighty will forgive him. That is, we hope his intention of starting and his adherence to his intention and his sincerity will make him approach Allah’s mercy and forgiveness, and will be forgiven for his remaining missed prayers.   

We should start. We should not despair of Allah’s mercy.

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