64 – al-Minhāl ibn ʿAmr, Abū ʿAmr al-Asadī, their freedman (Kh, 4), a Kufan.
He narrated from Anas ibn Mālik, Zirr ibn Hubaysh, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī Laylā, Abū ʿUmar Zādhān, and Saʿīd ibn Jubayr.
Those who transmitted from him include Ḥajjāj ibn Arṭāh, Zayd ibn Abī Unaysah, Manṣūr, Shuʿbah, al-Masʿūdī, Sawwār ibn Muṣʿab, and a large number of others.
It was said that Sawwār only reported from him through al-Aʿmash, and that later Shuʿbah stopped narrating from him because he once heard the sound of a musical instrument coming from his house (1).
Yahyā ibn Maʿīn and others declared him trustworthy.
Al-Dāraqutnī said, “Reliable.”
Ibn Ḥazm said, “Not strong.”
I say: his lengthy ḥadith about the grave is objectionable and singular; he transmits it from Zādhān, from al-Barāʾ (2).
He had recited the Qur’an before Saʿīd ibn Jubayr (3), and Ibn Abī Laylā and others in turn recited to him.
He died in one of the teen-years after 100 AH.
(*) Khalifa, Tabaqat, p. 160; al-Bukhari, al-Tarikh al-Kabir 8:12; Ibn Abi Hatim, al-Jarh wa-l-Taʿdil 8:356-357; al-Mizzi, Tahdhib al-Kamal, no. 1377; Ibn Hajar, Tadhhib al-Tahdhib 4:74:1; al-Dhahabi, Tarikh al-Islam 5:7; al-Dhahabi, Mizan al-Iʿtidal 4:192; Ibn al-Jazari, Tabaqat al-Qurraʾ 2:315; Ibn Hajar, Tahdhib al-Tahdhib 10:319-320.
(1) Al-Dhahabi states in Mizan al-Iʿtidal that the criticism arose “because a sound of singing was heard from his house,” but he immediately comments, “this is no grounds for censuring the shaykh.” In al-Jarh wa-l-Taʿdil 8:357 the wording is: “because a melodious, song-like Qurʾan recitation was heard coming from his home.”
(2) On the contrary, the hadith is hasan and free of defect. It is related by Imam Ahmad 4:287, 295, 296; by Abu Dawud (4753) in the Sunan, Book: “Asking at the grave”; declared sahih by al-Hakim 1:37, 40, a judgment the author endorses in his Mukhtasar.
(3) He also transmitted the report of Ibn ʿAbbas: “The Qurʾan was sent down to the lowest heaven on the Night of Qadr in one whole.” The author mentions this in his Tarikh 5:7. I add: Ibn Jarir records it 30:258, and al-Hakim 2:222 through the chain of Dawud ibn Abi Hind—ʿIkrima— Ibn ʿAbbas; al-Hakim also transmits it 2:222 through the chain of Jarir from …