Dear respected Shaykh, assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. With regards to making mash (wiping) over the socks, is mash made on both the top and the bottom of the socks or on the top only? ما يمسح من الخف؟

Praise be to Allah, and may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon the Messenger of Allah, his family and his companions.
Wa alaikum assalam wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh.
As to what follows:
The sunnah way of doing mash is over the socks according to the correct opinion of the 2 scholarly opinions. This is evidenced by what is narrated by Abu Dawud (162) and others in a hadith reported by Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) that:
“If the religion were based on opinion, it would be more important to wipe the under part of the leather socks than the upper but I have seen the Messenger of Allah (peace be on him) wiping over the upper part of his leather socks.”
A group of scholars are of the opinion that mash is made on both the upper part and under part of the socks. They base their view with a hadith narrated by Abu Dawud (165) and others on the authority of Al-Mughira Ibn Shu’bah (may Allah be pleased with him) that:
“The Messenger of Allah wiped over the top and the bottom of the leather socks.”
But this hadith has a weakness in its chain of narrators as Tirmidhi said. It was graded as weak by Bukhari, Abu Zar’ah and others.
And Allah knows best.

Your brother,
Dr. Khalid al-Muslih
17 / 2 / 1426 AH