= (2230) – transmitted through Muhammad ibn al-Muthanna, from Yahya ibn Saʿid, from ʿUbayd Allah ibn ʿUmar, from Nafiʿ, from Safiyya, from one of the Prophet’s wives – that the Prophet ﷺ said: “Whoever visits an ʿarraf (fortune-teller) and asks him about something, none of his prayers will be accepted for forty nights.” The ʿarraf is the astrologer who claims knowledge of the unseen, which God alone possesses, or the person who pretends to locate a stolen object, a lost animal, and the like. Abu Dawud also reported (3904), on the authority of Abu Hurayra, that the Messenger of God ﷺ said: “Whoever goes to a kahin (soothsayer) and believes what he says has disbelieved in what was revealed to Muhammad.” The same report appears in Ahmad 2/408, 476; al-Tirmidhi 135; Ibn Majah 639; and al-Darimi 1/259, with a strong chain of transmission. (1) Nevertheless, there are other narrations in this chapter that support it and thereby strengthen its authenticity. Al-Tirmidhi 31, Ibn Majah 430, Ibn al-Jarud p. 43, and al-Hakim 1/149 all relate—through ʿAmir ibn Shuqayq, from Abu Waʾil, from ʿUthman—that “the Prophet ﷺ used to run his fingers through his beard.” Abu Dawud 145 likewise records, from Anas, that “when the Messenger of God ﷺ performed ablution he would take a handful of water, place it under his chin, and pass it through his beard, saying: ‘Thus has my Lord commanded me.’” On the strength of these two corroborating chains, the hadith is sound. Additional supporting reports exist from ʿAʾisha, Abu Umama, and ʿAmmar; see Talkhis al-Habir 1/85–87. (2) Ibn Majah 2015 (Book of Marriage) also recorded it on the authority of Yahya ibn Maʿla ibn Mansur, from Ishaq ibn Muhammad al-Furawi, from ʿAbd Allah ibn ʿUmar, from Nafiʿ, from Ibn ʿUmar, with the wording: “The unlawful does not render the lawful unlawful.” Ishaq ibn Muhammad is truthful but became blind and his memory deteriorated; ʿAbd Allah ibn ʿUmar is weak. The intended meaning, they say, is that fornication does not create the impediment of affinity. This is also the position of al-Shafiʿi, but it is a fragile view because the report is not authentic. (3) Comparative study shows that by this expression the biographer does not intend formal authentication; he only signals that he cites the narrator’s hadith for corroboration and support. (4) That is, when another transmitter of equal or higher reliability narrates the same hadith, the two isnads reinforce each other and the report rises to the rank of hasan (fair).