13 – Musʿab ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Musʿab al-Asadī * (Q)
son of Thābit ibn ʿAbd Allāh, a descendant of the Messenger of Allah’s ﷺ disciple and cousin, al-Zubayr ibn al-ʿAwwām ibn Khuwaylid ibn Asad. An erudite, trustworthy imām, Abū ʿAbd Allāh, son of the governor of Yemen; a Qurashī, Asadī, Zubayrī, Medinan by birth who later settled in Baghdad.
He studied under: his father; Mālik ibn Anas; al-Ḍaḥḥāk ibn ʿUthmān; Ibrāhīm ibn Saʿd; ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Darāwardī; Hishām ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Makhzūmī; Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah; and others.
Among those who transmitted from him were: Ibn Mājah, with the ḥadīth on an-najsh (artificial price-inflation) (1); al-Nasāʾī, through an intermediary; al-Zubayr ibn Bakkār the judge—his nephew; Abū Yaʿlā al-Mawṣilī; Mūsā ibn Hārūn; Abū al-Qāsim al-Baghawī; Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Sarrāj; and many more.
He was declared reliable by al-Dāraquṭnī and others.
Some critics spoke against him for suspending judgment in the Qur’an controversy. Abū Bakr al-Marwazī said, “He was one of the Wāqifah.” I said to him, “But Wakīʿ and Abū Bakr ibn ʿAyyāsh used to say, ‘The Qur’an is uncreated.’” He replied, “Wakīʿ and Abū Bakr were mistaken.”