Traveler's prayer
part 1

A traveler should reduce the Rak’ats in Zuhr, Asr, and Isha prayers; that is, he should perform two Rak’ats instead of four, subject to the following eight conditions:

The first condition is that his journey is not less than 8 Farsakh. A Farsakh in Shariah is a little less than 51/2 kilometers.

1294. If the total of outward travel and return is 8 Farsakh, but only the outward journey is less than 4 Farsakh, he/she must offer shortened prayer. Therefore, if outward journey is 3 Farsakh and return is 5, he/she must offer complete Namaz.

1295. If the total of outward and return journey is just 8 Farsakh, the traveler should shorten his prayers, even if he does not return on the same day or night.

1296. If a brief journey is less than 8 Farsakh, or if a person does not know whether or not his journey is 8 Farsakh, he should not shorten his prayers. If he doubts whether or not his journey is 8 Farsakh, if investigation has difficulty (according to customary norms not according to reasoning), he/she should offer Namaz in complete form; and if it has not difficulty (as per the above definition), as an obligatory precaution, he/she must investigate. If two Adil persons testify or it is usually said by the people that the concerned distance is 8 Farsakh, he/she must shorten Namaz.

1297. If an Adil person says that the journey is 8 Farsakh, it seems that his word is not enough to prove the 8 Farsakh of journey and he/she must offer complete Namaz and it is better (more precautions) to offer both shortened and complete Namaz.

1298. If a person believed that his journey equaled 8 Farsakh, and he shortened his prayers, and learnt later that it was not 8 Farsakh, he should offer four Rak’ats of prayers, and if the time for the prayers has lapsed, he should perform its Qadha.

1299. If a person is sure that his journey is not of 8 Farsakh, or if he doubts whether or not it is of 8 Farsakh, if he realizes on his way that the distance of his journey had been 8 Farsakh, he should offer shortened prayers, even if very little remains of his journey. If he has offered complete prayers, he should offer it again in the shortened form.

1300. If a person frequents between two places which are less than 4 Farsakh apart, he should offer complete prayers, even if the total distance covered by him may add up to 8 Farsakh.

1301. If two roads lead to a place, one of the less than 8 Farsakh away, and the other 8 Farsakh or more, the traveler will offer shortened prayers if he travels by the road which is 8 Farsakh away, and complete prayers if he travels by the road which is less than 8 Farsakh away.

1302. If a city has walls around it, the beginning of city is calculated from that wall, and if there is no wall, the last houses of city should be taken into consideration, but in big cities, there is no special rule provided customarily going from one locality to another is not considered as traveling.