Yahya ibn Maʿin said: “The tafsir transmitted by Warqaʾ, from Ibn Abi Najih, from Mujahid, is dearer to me than the tafsir of Qatadah.” He added, “The tafsir related by Ibn Jurayj from Mujahid is mursal; he heard from him only a single word.”
Ibn Abi Maryam reported from Yahya ibn Maʿin that “Warqaʾ is trustworthy.”
Al-Kawsaj narrated from Yahya: “He is sound.”
Al-Mufaddal ibn Ghassan reported from Yahya, who said: “Shayban and Warqaʾ are both reliable.”
Yahya al-Qattan remarked, “The narrations of Mansur that come through Warqaʾ amount to nothing.”
Sulayman ibn Ishaq al-Jallab said: Ibrahim al-Harbi told me, “When Wakiʿ finished reading the tafsir he said, ‘Take it; it contains nothing from al-Kalbi and not a single thing from Warqaʾ.’”
Shababah reported: Shuʿbah told me, “Record the hadiths of Warqaʾ from Abu al-Zinad.”
Abu Dawud stated in his Masāʾil: “Warqaʾ is a man of the Sunnah, though he has a tendency toward irjaʾ, while Shibl is a Qadari (1).”
Ibn Abi Hatim said: “I asked Abu Zurʿah, ‘Which of the two do you prefer—Warqaʾ or Shuʿayb ibn…’”
= The commentary transmitted from Mujahid.
Shaykh al-Islam, in his tafsir of Surah al-Ikhlas (p. 94), refuted their claim, saying: “In his writings al-Shafi‘i most often quotes the explanation transmitted by Ibn ‘Uyaynah—from Ibn Abi Najih—from Mujahid, and al-Bukhari in his book likewise relies on this tafsir. As for the objection, ‘The report of Ibn Abi Najih from Mujahid is not sound,’ the answer is that the tafsir of Ibn Abi Najih from Mujahid is among the most reliable exegetical works. In fact, no tafsir currently in the hands of the scholars is more authentic than this one, except something equal to it in reliability.”
(1) Al-Shahrastani states that the Mu‘tazila call themselves “the People of Justice and Monotheism” but are nicknamed “Qadariyya,” because they attribute acts to the creature’s own power and deny divine decree, following the view of Ma‘bad al-Juhani and Ghaylan al-Dimashqi. Ibn al-Athir adds that they were called Qadariyya because they affirm for the servant a power that produces the act independently of Allah and deny that things occur by Allah’s decree and predestination.