…these statements run counter to the doctrine of the early generations (al-salaf) and are therefore unlikely to have been uttered by so great an imam. The phrases in question are: “Allah spoke to Moses directly, from His own mouth,” and “He handed him the Torah from His hand to Moses’ hand.” This may have led the author to question whether the treatise is genuinely by Imam Ahmad. In his work Taʾrikh al-Islam he writes: “…I say: the transmitters who relate this epistle from Ahmad are reliable masters, and I testify before God that he dictated it to his son. As for the other letters attributed to him, such as the epistle to al-Istakhri, their authenticity is debatable. God knows best.” (1) Al-Dhahabi, the present author, holds that the book Al-Radd ʿala al-Jahmiyya is falsely ascribed to Imam Ahmad. Some contemporary scholars have likewise doubted its attribution when annotating Ibn Qutayba’s Al-Ikhtilaf fi l-Lafz wa-l-Radd ʿala al-Jahmiyya. Their main argument is a missing link in the chain of transmission: the work is reported by Abu Bakr Ghulam al-Khallal, from al-Khallal, from al-Khadir b. al-Muthanna, from ʿAbd Allah b. Ahmad, from his father. Al-Khadir b. al-Muthanna is an unknown narrator; a report that passes through an unknown transmitter is criticised and its chain deemed defective. Moreover, the treatise contains ideas at odds with the creed of the early generations and with Ahmad’s authenticated statements elsewhere—hence al-Dhahabi’s rejection of its attribution. Nevertheless, several scholars accepted the attribution, cited the book and benefited from it: the judge Abu Yaʿla, Abu l-Wafaʾ Ibn ʿAqil, Imam al-Bayhaqi, Ibn Taymiyya and his student Ibn al-Qayyim. A manuscript copy is preserved in the Zahiriya Library in Damascus (collection no. 116); it contains only the text of Al-Radd ʿala al-Jahmiyya, i.e. half of the larger work. On the basis of that manuscript the book was published in Syria, edited by Muhammad Fahr al-Shaqfa. Further evidence against its authenticity is the total silence of those closest to Imam Ahmad—his contemporaries and immediate successors who wrote on the same topic—such as Imam al-Bukhari (d. 256 AH), ʿAbd Allah b. Muslim Ibn Qutayba (d. 276 AH) and Abu Saʿid al-Darimi (d. 280 AH). Even Abu l-Hasan al-Ashʿari, who recorded Ahmad’s creed in his Maqalat al-Islamiyyin, never mentions this book or makes use of it. (2) He is most likely referring to the treatise entitled Al-Salat, published in Egypt with critical notes by Hamid al-Faqi. Many later authorities of the Hanbali school quote from it and use its contents as evidence.