The Eid Prayer in the Jabbana (Outside the Settlement)

Question

Malegaon is a small town. Before the Uprising (Mutiny) of 1857 very few Muslims lived here, but after the Uprising they came from northern India and settled here in large numbers; now the Muslim population here is twenty-four thousand. For the Eid prayers an old and very small Eidgah (open ground for the Eid prayer) has been built, which can hold at most a thousand people. That Eidgah was certainly sufficient for the Muslims of that time, but now it cannot in any way be sufficient.

Answer

Performing the Eid prayer by going out to the open country (sahra’) is sunna, provided that there is nothing there that the Shari‘a disapproves of (munkar); and performing it in mosques is not makruh either, but the reward of the sunna will not be obtained.

Source: Fatawa Mahmudiyya

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