The 365 · Sunnah · Day 316 · Sleep
The Prohibition of Sleeping on the Stomach
The hadith
رَأَى النَّبِيُّ ﷺ رَجُلًا مُضْطَجِعًا عَلَى بَطْنِهِ، فَقَالَ: «إِنَّ هَذِهِ ضِجْعَةٌ يُبْغِضُهَا اللَّهُ».
The Prophet ﷺ saw a man lying on his stomach and said: 'Indeed, this is a sleeping posture Allah dislikes.' (Tirmidhi 2768; Abū Dāwūd 5040)
Svenska: Profeten ﷺ såg en man som låg på magen och sade: 'Sannerligen, detta är en sovställning som Allah ogillar.' (Tirmidhi 2768; Abū Dāwūd 5040)
Tirmidhi 2768; Abū Dāwūd 5040; Ibn Mājah 3723
The story
Abū Dharr narrated that the Prophet ﷺ was passing through the masjid one night and saw a man sleeping prone. He gently woke him with his foot and said the same: 'This is a sleeping posture Allah dislikes.' The Companion never slept that way again, and the hadith passed into the Ummah's memory.
Why it's here
Allah named this posture as disliked through His Messenger ﷺ. The Companions noted that sleeping prone (face-down on the stomach) is the posture of the people of fire in some narrations; sleeping supine (face-up) with one leg crossed over the other is prohibited; sleeping on the right side (with the right hand under the cheek) is the Sunnah. The body's posture in sleep is a quiet test of obedience.
Try it today
Train yourself out of stomach-sleeping if it has become a habit. Start on the right side. If you find yourself rolling onto the stomach, return to the right. The body learns within weeks. For children, teach the position early so they never know any other.
In your day
Modern sleep science confirms the harms of prone sleeping for adults: increased pressure on internal organs, neck strain, restricted breathing. The Sunnah anticipated this without needing the study. The Prophet's ﷺ words 'a sleeping posture Allah dislikes' carries the weight of revelation; the body's mechanics are aligned with it.
A reflection to carry
Allah's pleasure includes even our posture in unconsciousness. The Sunnah extends to where we have not yet thought to look.
Read the longer reflection
There is a profound theology in even the smallest Sunnah. The believer's posture during sleep, the hours when he is not conscious, is named by Allah. He dislikes one position; He prefers another. The believer aligns. This is the meaning of ʿubudiyyah at its purest: even where you cannot watch yourself, you obey Him. The right-side position is one He loves; the stomach is one He dislikes. Choose the loved. The body that was carried for eight hours in the position He prefers carries a quiet barakah into the morning, the way water carries the shape of its vessel. May our bodies, even in sleep, learn the postures of submission.
Sources: Tirmidhi, Abu Dawud, Ibn Majah. The Qur'an and its translation are verified; the scholarship is retold faithfully in our own words and credited to its sources, never reproduced verbatim.
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