that he retained it. The Ṣaḥīfah of Jābir was read to him only once, yet he memorized it.
ʿAbd Allāh ibn Idrīs said that Shuʿbah remarked, “I tested Qatādah with seventy hadiths, and in every one of them he said, ‘I heard Anas ibn Mālik.’” Shuʿbah also said, “No direct hearing is known for Qatādah from Abū Rāfiʿ.”
Yahyā ibn Maʿīn stated, “Qatādah did not hear from Saʿīd ibn Jubayr or from Mujāhid.” Yahyā ibn Saʿīd al-Qaṭṭān added, “Nor did Qatādah hear from Sulaymān ibn Yasār,” and Imām Aḥmad said, “He did not hear from Muʿādhah al-ʿAdawiyyah.”
I (the author) say: Scholars have counted a number of Qatādah’s narrations from various transmitters in this manner without direct hearing, for he practiced tadlīs.
Wakīʿ related that Saʿīd ibn Abī ʿArūbah, Hishām al-Dastuwāʾī and others used to say: “Qatādah said, ‘Everything is governed by decree—except sins.’ (1)”
Ḍamrah narrated from Ibn Shawdhab, who said, “Qatādah would not be content until he shouted it aloud—meaning belief in predestination (qadar).”
I say: We have already offered an excuse for him and for those like him; Allah has excused them—and how excellent that is. Yet if He should punish them, surely Allah does not wrong people in the least. Indeed, to Him belong the creation and the command.
Qatādah was also a foremost authority in Arabic language, rare vocabulary, the historical ‘Days of the Arabs’, and their genealogies,
(1) It is most likely that the form of qadar (divine decree) which Qatadah denied is the same fatalism the Qur’an ascribes to the mushrikun when it says, “Those who associate others with Allah will say, ‘Had Allah willed, neither we nor our fathers would have committed shirk, nor would we have forbidden anything…’” (Qur’an 6:148). Allah refutes this claim, branding it as falsehood, ignorance, and mere conjecture: “Those before them likewise cried lies until they tasted Our punishment. Say, ‘Have you any certain knowledge that you can produce for us? You follow nothing but assumption; you do nothing but guess’” (Qur’an 6:148–149). All recognized Sunni authorities agree that human capacity is effective in producing deeds, just as natural causes produce their effects, by Allah’s permission, who has linked causes to results—as confirmed by sense-experience, reason, and revelation. Allah, exalted be He, dislikes that His servants commit evil, even though such acts occur by His will, for nothing happens in His dominion without His willing it. This willing, however, does not mean that He loves the evil; it only means that evil does not take place against His will—far be He above that. Moreover, the divine will does not force a person to commit sin: had the servant chosen good instead of evil, that good would equally have occurred by Allah’s will. Thus both obedience and disobedience proceed from the servant under Allah’s will and decree, yet without any coercion upon him, just as His will does not compel the servant to perform the sin he actually commits.