Abū Hurayrah, concerning fighting in the path of Allah, but he refused to relate it to me.
I said to him, “Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd al-Anṣārī gives a differing chain: from al-Maqburī, from ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Qatādah, from his father.”
He replied, “Should I transmit that?!”—he seemed astonished.
I added, “Ibn ʿAjlān has been declared reliable by Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal and Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn, and both Shuʿbah and Mālik narrated from him. His reports are ḥasan (sound) and stronger than those of Ibn Isḥāq, though they are not on a par with ʿUbayd Allāh ibn ʿUmar and the like.”
Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥākim said, “Muslim included thirteen of his traditions in his book, all of them as corroborating reports, and the later scholars among our imams have spoken of his weak memory.”
ʿAbbās al-Dūrī transmitted from Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn that he said, “Ibn ʿAjlān is more trustworthy than Muḥammad ibn ʿAmr; no one doubts this.”
Among those who considered him reliable are Ibn ʿUyaynah and Abū Ḥātim al-Rāzī, despite the latter’s rigor in judging narrators.
Ibn al-Qāsim reported: It was said to Mālik, “Some people of knowledge relate”—meaning the report, “Allah created Adam in His image.” He asked, “Who are they?” They answered, “Ibn ʿAjlān.” Mālik replied, “Ibn ʿAjlān did not understand such matters, and he was not a scholar.”
I say: Muḥammad was not the sole narrator of this ḥadith, and the tradition is found in both Ṣaḥīḥ collections. (1)
Al-Bukhārī said: ʿAlī told me, on the authority of