Advice of Scholars - SUNNATS ARE OF TWO KINDS

It is written in Hadîqat-un-nadiyya, on the hundred and forty-first page: “Sunnats are of two kinds: sunnat-i hudâ and sunnat-i zawâid. Sunnat-i hudâ are like i’tikâf in a mosque, calling the azân or iqâmat, and performing salât in jamâ’at. They are the characteristic traits of Islam, properties peculiar to this Ummat. [It is written in Ibni Âbidîn, at the end of the last volume that circumcision of children is also a sunnat of this kind. ] If the inhabitants of a city abandon any one of these sunnats, they are to be fought against. The rawâtib, that is, the muakkad sunnats, of three of the fard five daily prayers are of this kind, too. Sunnat-i zawâid involve doing the customs which Rasûlullah, (sallallâhu ’alaihi wa sallam), habitually did in clothing, eating, drinking, sitting, housing, sleeping, walking, beginning the good deeds with the right-hand side, eating, and drinking with the right hand.”