Rāfiʿ.
I replied, “On the contrary, he did hear from him, for in Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī there is the report of Sulaymān al-Taymī, from Qatādah: ‘I heard Abū Rāfiʿ relate from Abū Hurayrah the ḥadīth, “Indeed, My mercy has prevailed over My wrath.”’ (1)
Maʿmar said that Qatādah declared, “I kept the company of al-Ḥasan for twelve years; for three of those I performed the dawn prayer with him. Someone like me could only take knowledge from someone like him.”
Ibn ʿUlayyah stated that Qatādah died in 118 AH.
133 – Nāfiʿ ibn Mālik ibn Abī ʿĀmir al-Asbaḥī al-Madanī (ʿ)
The imam, jurist, Abū Suhayl al-Asbaḥī of Medina.
He narrated from Ibn ʿUmar, Sahl ibn Saʿd, Anas ibn Mālik, Saʿīd ibn al-Musayyib, and his father, from whom he transmitted copiously.
Those who transmitted from him include his nephew Mālik ibn Anas, Ibn Shihāb—his contemporary—Sulaymān ibn Bilāl, Ismāʿīl ibn Jaʿfar, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Darāwardī, and others.
Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal and other scholars declared him reliable.
He lived on until shortly before 130 AH.
Abu Dawud had declared the report weak on the grounds that Qatadah never heard directly from Abu Rafi‘. The present author, followed by Ibn Hajar in Fath al-Bari, 11/27, rejects this objection, showing that Qatadah’s audition from Abu Rafi‘ is established by the very hadith preserved in Sahih al-Bukhari, 13/439. The narration is further backed by a parallel chain transmitted by al-Bukhari in al-Adab al-mufrad (no. 1076) and by Abu Dawud (no. 5189) through Muhammad b. Sirin, from Abu Hurayrah, with the wording: “The messenger of a man to another man counts as his permission.” A corroborative mawquf report from Ibn Masud appears in al-Bukhari’s al-Adab al-mufrad (no. 1074): “When a man is invited, he has been granted permission.”
(1) Al-Bukhari, Sahih, 13/439, Book of Tawhid, chapter on the verse “Rather, it is a Glorious Quran in a Preserved Tablet,” from al-Mu‘tamar, from his father, from Qatadah, from Abu Rafi‘, from Abu Hurayrah: “Allah wrote a book before creating the creation: ‘My mercy precedes My wrath,’ and it is written with Him above the Throne.”
(*) Biographical sources for the narrator: al-Bukhari, al-Tarikh al-kabir, 8/86; al-Fasawi, Tarikh, 1/406; Ibn Abi Hatim, al-Jarh wa-l-ta‘dil, 8/453; al-Mizzi, Tahdhib al-kamal, no. 1403; Ibn Hajar, Tadhhib al-tadhhib, 4/91/1; al-Dhahabi, Tarikh al-Islam, 5/307; Ibn Hajar, Tahdhib al-tahdhib, 10/409; al-Khazraji, Khulasa tadhhib al-kamal, 399.