“Darraj is a transmitter of many objectionable narrations.”

I add: Among those objectionable reports is the ḥadith, “Make abundant mention of Allah until people say, ‘He is mad!’” Ahmad recorded it, immediately after the foregoing ḥadith, with the same chain of transmission.

(d) He also states: Al-Ṭabarānī and al-Bazzār transmitted—through a sound chain—from Abū al-Dardāʾ that the Prophet ﷺ said, “The mosque is the house of every God-fearing person, and Allah has guaranteed….”

I say: I have not yet found the chain in order to examine it, nor have I seen anyone who explicitly declared it ṣaḥīḥ. Al-Mun­dhirī, quoting the original compiler al-Bazzār, merely said, “Its chain is ḥasan.” From where, then, does the grading of ṣaḥīḥ come? It is likely that the author assumed its soundness on the basis of al-Haythamī’s remark in Majmaʿ al-Zawāʾid: “The narrators of al-Bazzār are all narrators of the Ṣaḥīḥ.” That inference, however, does not necessarily hold, for many reasons I set out in the Introduction—consult it if you wish.

When I later consulted its chain in Zawāʾid al-Bazzār, p. 434, it became clear that the isnād is indeed sound; nevertheless, al-Bazzār’s version does not contain the wording “The mosque is the house of every God-fearing person.” That phrase appears only in the report of al-Ṭabarānī and others. I authenticated it in al-Ṣaḥīḥa, 716, and cited it in Ṣaḥīḥ al-Targhīb, 326.

Concerning the superiority of particular mosques, he cites al-Bayhaqī’s report from Jābir, traced back to the Prophet: “A prayer in al-Masjid al-Ḥarām is equal to one hundred thousand prayers; a prayer in my mosque equals one thousand prayers; and a prayer in Bayt al-Maqdis equals five hundred prayers.” Al-Suyūṭī graded it ḥasan.

I say: There are several points to note. First: his reliance on al-Suyūṭī’s grading, when al-Suyūṭī merely indicated that verdict by means of a symbol.