“Knowledge will remain in Madinah as long as this young man lives—meaning Ibn Ishaq—but Musʿab also related to me that people criticised him for something that had nothing to do with hadith.”
Yaʿqub ibn Shaybah said, “I asked ʿAli, ‘How do you regard the hadith transmitted by Ibn Ishaq—are they sound?’ He answered, ‘Yes, in my view they are sound.’ I said, ‘Then what of Malik’s remarks about him?’ He replied, ‘Malik never kept his company and never really knew him; besides, what exactly did Ibn Ishaq narrate while he was in Madinah?!’ I asked, ‘And Hisham ibn ʿUrwah—did he not speak against him?’ ʿAli said, ‘What Hisham said is not authoritative. Perhaps Ibn Ishaq once entered upon his wife while still a boy and heard something from her. His narrations plainly show truthfulness: at one time he says, “Abu al-Zinad narrated to me,” and at another, “Abu al-Zinad mentioned…”. He will transmit from a man, from someone he heard, who says:
“Sufyan ibn Saʿid narrated to me, from Salim Abu al-Nadr, from ʿUmayr (1): ‘Fasting on the Day of ʿArafah…’ (2),”
and he is among the most prolific transmitters from Abu al-Nadr. Likewise he says:
“Hasan ibn Dinar narrated to me, from Ayyub, from ʿAmr ibn Shuʿayb, concerning an advance sale and an ordinary sale (3),”
and he is also one of the most prolific transmitters from ʿAmr.
(1) The base manuscript and Tarikh Baghdad, 1/229, read “Umar,” but this is a copyist’s slip; the report is well known with Umair, the freedman of Ibn Abbas, as will be shown below.
(2) Tarikh Baghdad, 1/229. Sufyan ibn Saʿid is al-Thawri. Muslim transmits the hadith through Ishaq ibn Ibrahim and Ibn Abi ʿUmar, both from Sufyan, from Salim Abu al-Nadr; and also through Zuhayr ibn Harb, from ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Mahdi, from Sufyan. Malik records it in the Muwattaʾ, 1/375, from Salim Abu al-Nadr, from Umair, the freedman of ʿAbd Allah ibn Abbas, from Umm al-Fadl: some people argued in her presence on the Day of ʿArafah about the Messenger of Allah ﷺ—some saying he was fasting, others that he was not. Umm al-Fadl therefore sent him a cup of milk while he was mounted on his camel at ʿArafah, and he drank it. Through Malik the report is also found in Ahmad, 6/340; al-Bukhari, 4/206, Book of Fasting, “Chapter on fasting the Day of ʿArafah”; Muslim, no. 1123, Book of Fasting, “Chapter on the desirability for pilgrims to break the fast on the Day of ʿArafah”; and Abu Dawud, no. 2441.
(3) Related by Ahmad (nos. 6628, 6671), Abu Dawud (3504), al-Nasaʾi, 7/288, al-Tayalisi, 3/264, and Ibn Majah (2188) through several chains from Ayyub, from ʿAmr ibn Shuʿayb, from his father, from his grandfather, who said that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ declared: “Combining a loan with a sale is unlawful.” The isnad is sound (hasan), and al-Tirmidhi graded it hasan sahih.