Question: I have heard from some scholars that oil is an obstacle which prevents water from reaching the body during wudu. Sometimes while cooking, a few drops of oil fall onto my hair and the parts of wudu. So is it necessary to wash those parts with soap before wudu or ghusl so that water can reach there? Similarly, for treatment purposes I sometimes apply oil to my hair as well. In these circumstances, what should I do? Kindly inform me.
Answer: Before answering this question, I would like to present the following statement of Allah:
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِذَا قُمْتُمْ إِلَى الصَّلَاةِ فَاغْسِلُوا وُجُوهَكُمْ وَأَيْدِيَكُمْ إِلَى الْمَرَافِقِ وَامْسَحُوا بِرُءُوسِكُمْ وَأَرْجُلَكُمْ إِلَى الْكَعْبَيْنِ
“O you who believe! When you rise to pray, wash your faces and your hands up to the elbows, wipe your heads, and wash your feet up to the ankles.”
The command to wash these parts and to wipe them necessitates that anything which prevents water from reaching the parts of wudu must be removed, because if it remains, the parts of wudu will not be washed. Therefore we can say that when a person applies oil to the parts of wudu, it is of two possibilities: either the oil is solid, in which case it must be removed before wudu, because if the oil remains in its thick form it will be an obstacle to water reaching the body, and purification will not be valid.
The second possibility is that the oil is liquid and has no thickness, and only its effect remains on the parts of wudu; such oil is not harmful. In this case, water must pass over all the parts of wudu, because normally oil stays separate from water, and so at times water does not reach the parts of wudu.
Therefore we would say to the questioner that if oil or similar substances are on the parts of wudu in solid form, then they must be removed before wudu; and if the oil is in liquid form, there is no harm in performing wudu without using soap. Only, while washing the parts, they should be rubbed well so that the water does not simply slide off and leave the parts dry.
