Yaḥyā al-Qaṭṭān also said: Ibn al-Muʾammal informed me, from Ibn Ṣafwān, who related:
Ibn Abī Najīḥ said to me, “I invite you to the opinion of al-Ḥasan”—meaning the doctrine of qadar (predestination).
It is further reported from one of the narrators that Ibn Abī Najīḥ did not hear the whole of the Qurʾānic commentary from Mujāhid. I say: he was in fact among the people most closely attached to Mujāhid.
Al-Bukhārī said, “He was suspected of iʿtizāl and of the Qadari doctrine.” Ibn al-Madīnī remarked, “He inclined toward iʿtizāl.” Aḥmad declared, “They ruined him toward the end; he had kept company with ʿAmr ibn ʿUbayd.” ʿAlī said: I heard Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd say, “Ibn Abī Najīḥ was one of the leading propagators (1).”
ʿAlī added: “As for the field of exegesis, he is reliable and knowledgeable; he has ‘crossed the bridge,’ and the compilers of the sound collections have used him as evidence.
“Perhaps he later abandoned the innovation, for a number of trustworthy scholars espoused the doctrine of qadar and erred—may Allah pardon us.”
He died in 131 AH.
About one hundred hadiths traced back to the Prophet are known from him.
(1) Ibn Hibban states in his Tarikh al-Thiqat, under the biography of Jaʿfar ibn Sulayman al-Dubaʿi: “None of the hadith scholars who are our leading authorities differs over the fact that it is permissible to adduce the reports of a truthful, reliable transmitter who happens to hold a bidʿa (theological innovation) as long as he does not invite others to it. If, however, he begins to propagate his bidʿa, his reports lose all probative value.”
The clause “If he begins to propagate his bidʿa, his reports lose all probative value” is debatable, for al-Bukhari relied on ʿImran ibn Hittan, an open advocate of the Shurat (the militant wing of the Kharijites), and on ʿAbd al-Hamid ibn ʿAbd al-Rahman al-Himmani, who actively promoted irjaʾ (the doctrine of the Murjiʾa).
The sound position is to accept the narration of anyone who belongs to the qibla, performs the prayer as we do, and, in general, affirms what our Messenger brought, provided he is truthful, precise in transmission, and does not regard lying as lawful. Such a person can only have fallen into his innovation through taʾwil (interpretive reasoning), basing it on the Quran or the Sunnah as he understood them by his ijtihad (independent juristic effort); every mujtahid receives a reward even when he errs. This, however, is subject to the condition that he does not deny any matter that is mass-transmitted and necessarily known to be part of the religion.