—and what punishment could be harsher than blindness?”

She added, “He used to defend—indeed, to answer back in satire—for the Messenger of Allah (1), peace and blessings be upon him.”

A report from ʿĀʾishah, traced to the Prophet ﷺ regarding Ḥassān, states: “Only a believer loves him, and only a hypocrite hates him.”

This is a munkar hadith, recorded in the Musnad of al-Ruyānī, transmitted by Abū Thumāmah—an unknown narrator—through ʿUmar ibn Ismāʿīl—also unknown—on the authority of Hishām ibn ʿUrwah.

It does, however, have supporting witnesses. Al-Wāqidī related it from Saʿīd ibn Abī Zayd al-Anṣārī, from an unnamed man, from Abū ʿUbaydah ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Zamʿah, who heard Ḥamzah ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUmar, who in turn heard ʿĀʾishah say:
“I heard the Messenger of Allah ﷺ say, ‘Ḥassān is a barrier between the believers and the hypocrites; no hypocrite loves him and no believer hates him.’”

This wording is the more plausible of the two.
A third category remains—those who simply love him—but the report is silent about them.

Hudaij ibn Muʿāwiyah, from Abū Isḥāq, from Saʿīd ibn Jubayr, reported:
“It was said to Ibn ʿAbbās, ‘Ḥassān the accursed has arrived!’
Ibn ʿAbbās replied, ‘He is not accursed; he strove alongside the Messenger of Allah ﷺ with both his person and his tongue (2).’”

I say: this indicates that he actually took part in military expeditions.

ʿAbdah ibn Sulaymān, from Abū Ḥayyān al-Taymī, from Ḥabīb ibn Abī Thābit, said: Ḥassān recited before the Prophet ﷺ: