Do I Need to Purify Items Touched After Using Wet Wipes in the Bathroom?
Shafi'i Fiqh
Answered by Ustadha Shazia Ahmad
Question
If I used wet wipes to clean menstrual impurities during a water outage and then touched various items with damp hands, do I have to wash everything I touched?
Answer
Thank you for your question. If you used wet wipes to clean yourself, you don’t need to purify anything unless you are sure that you got filth on your hands and then proceeded to touch something while your hand was wet.
Wiping Hands From Filth
It says in the Reliance of the Traveller:
“Washing Away Filth
e14.10 As for kinds of filth that are ‘without substance’ (N: i.e., without discernible characteristic (najasa hukmiyya) such as a drop of dry urine on a garment that can not be seen), it is sufficient (N: to purify it) that water flow over it.” [Keller, Reliance of the Traveller]
If your hands did have some menstrual impurity, like blood, on them, and you wiped away that blood with wet wipes, you would have najasa hukmiyya on your hands as stated above. Your hands were not purified. In a place where you might have water outages, you should use drinking water to pour over your hands or keep a reservoir of tap water somewhere for cases like this.
Transfer of Filth
That being said, filth is only transferred through moisture. So if your hand and the item you touched were both dry, there was no filth transferred, and you should rest easy. If one of them was wet, then you would simply flow some water over the item. If you have no idea, certainty is not lifted by doubt (an important shari‘a principle) and you must assume everything is pure. It’s very important not to be overcome doubt and misgivings caused by the Devil.
Dua
Please make this dua of the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) regularly:
اللَّهُمَّ إِنِّي أَعُوذُ بِكَ مِنَ الشَّيْطَانِ الرَّجِيمِ وَهَمْزِهِ وَنَفْخِهِ وَنَفْثِهِ
“O Allah, I seek refuge in You from the accursed Satan, from his whispering, his prompting (arrogance), and his evil poetry (insinuations).“ [Ibn Maja]
Please see more details here:
- How Much Filth Is Excused in the Shafi’i School?
- How to Deal With Waswas Regarding Purity According to the Shafi’i School?
- Filth that is excused
- How Do I Deal with Obsessive Thoughts about Impurity on Household Objects?
- Is It Valid to Clean My Private Parts by Wiping with Dry
May Allah give you the best of this world and the next.
[Ustadha] Shazia Ahmad
Checked and Approved by Shaykh Irshaad Sedick
Ustadha Shazia Ahmad lived in Damascus, Syria, for two years, where she studied ‘aqida, fiqh, tajweed, tafsir, and Arabic. She then attended the University of Texas at Austin, where she completed her Masters in Arabic. Afterward, she moved to Amman, Jordan, where she studied fiqh, Arabic, and other sciences. She later moved back to Mississauga, Canada, where she lives with her family.
