I met Thauban the client of God’s Messenger and asked him to tell me something I should do for which God would bring me into paradise. He gave no reply, so I asked him again, and when he still gave no reply I asked him a third time. He then said that he had asked God’s Messenger about that and received the reply, “Make frequent prostration before God, for you will not make one prostration without God raising you a degree because of it and removing a sin from you because of it.” Ma'dan said that he met Abud Darda’ later, and that when he asked him he received a reply similar to that given by Thauban.
I was with God’s Messenger at night, and when I brought him his water for ablution and what he required, he told me to make a request. I said, “I ask to accompany you in paradise.” He asked if I had any other request to make, and when I replied that that was all, he said, “Then help me to accomplish this for you by devoting yourself often to prostration.”
Wa’il b. Hujr said he saw that when God’s Messenger prostrated himself he got down on his knees before putting his hands on the ground, and when he got up he raised his hands before his knees.
Abu Dawud, Tirmidhi, Nasa’i, Ibn Majah and Darimi transmitted it.
When a man recites as-Sajda (Al-Qur’an; 32) the devil retires weeping and saying, “Woe is me! The son of Adam has been commanded to prostrate himself and has done so, and will be rewarded with paradise; but I have been commanded to prostrate myself and have refused, so I will be punished with hell.”
