In another mursal report he said, “Would that it had been no more than worthless, dried dung.”
It is said that Abū Hudhayfah lived fifty-three years.
14 – Sālim, the freedman of Abū Hudhayfah *
One of the very first believers, a veteran of Badr, one of those brought near, and among the learned.
Mūsā ibn ʿUqbah said: He is Sālim ibn Maʿqil; his origin ⦗1⦘ was from Istakhr. He became the client of Abū Hudhayfah, yet the one who actually set him free was Thubaytah bint Yaʿār al-Anṣāriyyah, the wife of Abū Hudhayfah ibn ʿUtbah, and Abū Hudhayfah then adopted him—that is how Mūsā related it.
Ibn Abī Mulaykah transmitted from al-Qāsim ibn Muḥammad that Sahla bint Suhayl came to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ—she was the wife of Abū Hudhayfah—and said,
“O Messenger of Allah, Sālim stays with me, and he has now reached a man’s age.”
He replied, “Breastfeed him; once you have breastfed him, he is forbidden to you just as a blood-relative maḥram is.”
Umm Salamah said: The wives of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ refused to allow anyone to enter upon them on the basis of such nursing, saying, “It was merely a special concession for Sālim alone.” ⦗2⦘
(*) Ibn Saʿd, al-Tabaqat, 3/1, pp. 60–62; al-Bukhari, al-Tarikh al-Kabir, 4/107; al-Tarikh al-Saghir, 1/38, 40; Ibn Qutayba, al-Maʿarif, p. 273; Ibn Hibban, Mashahir ʿUlamaʾ al-Amsar, p. 101; Ibn al-Jawzi, al-Istibsar, pp. 294–296; Abu Nuʿaym, Hilyat al-Awliyaʾ, 1/176–178; Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr, al-Istiʿab, 4/101–104; Ibn al-Athir, Usd al-Ghabah, 2/307–309; al-Nawawi, Tahdhib al-Asmaʾ wa-l-Lughat, 1/206–207.
(1) In the printed edition the word was mistakenly read as “ fi ”.
(2) Reported by Ibn Saʿd, 3/1, pp. 60–61, with reliable transmitters, though the chain is mursal (the Companion is omitted). A fully connected chain is provided by Ahmad, 6/201; Muslim, no. 1453 (section 28) in the Book of Breast-feeding, chapter “Breast-feeding of an adult”; and al-Nasaʾi, 6/105, in the Book of Marriage, same chapter, through the route of Ibn Jurayj—who said: Ibn Abi Mulayka informed us—from al-Qasim b. Muhammad—from ʿAʾisha. The report is also found in Muslim, no. 1453; al-Nasaʾi, 6/104; and Ibn Majah, no. 1943, via Sufyan b. ʿUyayna—from ʿAbd al-Rahman b. al-Qasim—from his father—from ʿAʾisha; likewise in Ahmad, 6/228; Abu Dawud, no. 2061, in the Book of Marriage, chapter “Those rendered unmarriageable by breast-feeding”; and in ʿAbd al-Razzaq’s Musannaf, nos. 13886 and 13887, through the isnad of Ibn Shihab.