professional singers. The Prophet ﷺ lay down on the mattress and turned his face away. Abu Bakr then came in—while the Prophet ﷺ was wrapped in his cloak—and he rebuked me; in another wording he rebuked the two girls, saying, “A flute—,” in yet another, “the flute of Satan in the presence of—,” and in another, “Are the flutes of Satan being played in the house of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ?” [he said it twice].

Thereupon the Messenger of Allah ﷺ turned toward him—in another narration the Prophet ﷺ uncovered his face—and said, “Leave them alone, Abu Bakr, for every people has a festival and this is our festival.” When he was distracted, I signalled to the girls and they slipped out.

Ibn Ḥazm cited this report to argue for the permissibility of singing accompanied by the duff (frame-drum), commenting on ʿĀʾishah’s words “and they were not professional singers” as follows:

“We agree, yet she also said they were singing, so their singing is established. Her statement ‘they were not professional singers’ only means they were not highly skilled. None of this constitutes proof; the proof lies in the Prophet’s ﷺ objection to Abu Bakr when he said, ‘The flute of Satan in the presence of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ?’ Hence it is indisputably lawful, without the slightest dislike, and whoever censures it is undoubtedly mistaken.”

In reply I say—and in Allah do I seek aid:

It is perfectly clear to anyone who looks at this ḥadīth that it does not contain the blanket permission he claims. Were his reading accepted, the ruling would extend from two young slave girls to adult women and even to men; from the duff to every musical instrument; and from the day of ʿĪd to every day of the year. This is a manifest error—an attempt to make the ḥadīth bear what it cannot bear, stemming from an even more obvious mistake that