The Albaani Site

Questioner: Is it allowed for the Imaam of a mosque or a daa’ee, who leads the people in the mosque for taraweeh … between the rak’ahs there’s a break in which he reminds them of certain issues, for example, about performing the prayer well and following the Prophet ﷺ, and alerts them to certain innovations or acts of shirk, yes, alerts them [to such things], ya’nee?

Al-Albaani: The answer is that it is [both] permissible and not permissible: if he is alerting or warning them, ordering or prohibiting them about something incidental then it is a must.

As for making it something structured and customary, [where] between every four rak’ahs, for example, or more or less than that, the Imaam gives a lecture, then this is in opposition to the Sunnah.

If it is about something unexpected then it is waajib to alert them about it, as for taking that to be something structured, then the taraweeh prayer is an unmixed act of worship in which the Muslim turns to Allaah عز وجل with all his limbs, core, mind and heart, this is the goal of the qiyaam in Ramadaan.

As for having sittings between two or four rak’ahs as something structured, then that was not from the Prophet’s guidance ﷺ.

Al-Hudaa wan-Noor, 656.