“Fever Is From the Heat of Hellfire”: Shaykh Ibn ʿUthaymīn Explains the Hadith of Cooling Fever With Water

عن ابن عمر رضي الله عنهما عن النبي ﷺ قال الحمى من فيح جهنم فأطفئوها بالماء

On the authority of Ibn Umar, who reported from the Prophet ﷺ that he said: “Fever is from the heat of the hellfire. So extinguish it with water.” (Al-Bukhārī 10/185 no. 5391)

Shaykh Muhammad ibn Sālih Al-‘Uthaymīn said:

“This Hadīth indicates that the treatment for fever is by using cold water and that it cools it down, even if the fever takes place within a cool place. This is because the fever is upon the sick person himself. The people of knowledge say: ‘The outer portion of the body is the opposite of the inner. So when the outside of the body is cool the inside warms and if the inside is cool the outside is warmed. This water abates the fever until the heat of it lowers and the body temperature evens out. From that which is known is that the temperaments of the body are four:

a.) Heat

b.) Cold

c.) Moisture

d.) Dryness

When these four temperaments are in balance the body attains homeostasis. If there is deficit (or excess) in one of them the body will be off balance in proportion to that. 

When water comes to this heat which has raged and has come to the outside of the body it is abated and retreats within the body; at that point the body will be in balance. 

This treatment which the Prophet ﷺ has mentioned is beneficial, even within this time of ours. How beneficial this is, if that (increase in temperature) is caused by the intensity of the sun; it is greatly beneficial. Due to this, one places upon (the one who temperature has become very hot) ice or a cloth that has been cooled by very cold water. Rather, many doctors say that if a child is affected with a fever that they should be placed if front of an air conditioner but the fan should at its lowest speed.” (Sharh Sahīh Al-Bukhārī 12/607-608)

Translated by Raha Batts