Is it sunnah or makruh to shake hands (do musafaha) in a mosque after performing the prayer??

What is your opinion about shaking hands or hugging after praying in the mosque and saying, “May Allah accept it”, which has recently become common in almost all mosques? It is said that it is makruh to shake hands inside the mosque, except for the imam.

Dear Brother / Sister,

Western customs, which are gradually corrupting our behavior in our daily lives, introduce foreign customs materialistic etiquette rules to our human relations. Against them, it has become a duty to preserve our own customs and traditions that fortify the spirit of national unity and to resist being overwhelmed by the influence of foreign customs.

According to one of the strong and sound customs of us that shape our personality based on the hadith,

“Greeting comes before speaking”,

it is necessary to greet the person we meet first and then to shake hands with them.

In fact, greeting is not only a means of starting a conversation, but also a prayer for our interlocutors. When we greet a friend we meet, it means we pray for him and ask Allah to keep him safe from accidents and misfortunes.

In this way, greeting is also a form of worship, which is never the case in foreign customs.

After that, the handshaking we will make according to our degree of sincerity also has a separate sacred value. As a matter of fact, it is indicated in a hadith that if two Muslims come face to face and shake hands and greet each other, their sins will be washed away like yellow leaves falling from the branches.

In other words, like greeting (salam), handshake (musafaha) is a lofty manner that contains the sanctity of worship.

Our customs like those are not simple habits that we have developed on our own. All of the customs of Muslims are based on religious evidence. We have adopted them and established them in our lives based on such evidence. Therefore, foreign customs and habits that are not based on religious evidence cannot enter our lives and overwhelm and influence us. What is more, if our custom of greeting and handshake is practiced in places where it is not even our custom, we will not allow it, and we will not consent to it being mixed with our custom. As a matter of fact, the custom of handshaking after the prayer in the mosque, which the reader asked about, is like that.

In some neighborhoods, when the congregation is about to get up and disperse, they line up and shake hands with one another inside the mosque. Those who do not line up are condemned and asked why they turn away from the sunnah...

We should state right away that there is no sunnah custom of lining up for shaking hands in the mosque after the prayer. There are decrees that such handshaking is “bid’ah”. In some of Imam Nawawi’s works, it is stated that in his time, this handshaking started after fajr (morning) and asr (afternoon) prayers, and later on it was practiced after all prayers.

The following is stated in the fatwa of “Shamsur-Ramli”: “This is a bid’ah. However, there is no harm in doing it.”

It is understood that this custom, which is continued especially by sufis, is not an original custom but was introduced later. Perhaps it is a matter that should not be dwelt upon. However, it should be kept in mind that in the May 27, 1979 issue of (At-Tarbiyetul-Islam), published in Bagdad, the following decree was made: Majmua’s decree:

“The most virtuous thing is to abandon this greeting inside the mosque, especially for the imams because the congregation considers it obligatory when the imams do it. Ibn Abidin also points out that on some Fridays and Eids it is permissible to do so without making it a custom.”

So, it is sometimes permissible to do provided that it is not made a custom and not insisted upon.

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