From the Introduction
...
From the Introduction

Under the heading “The Universality of the Message” the author writes: “Al-Bukhari transmits, in a hadith traced back to the Prophet through Abu Saʿid al-Khudri: ‘Indeed, this religion is ease …’ ”

I reply: Two points must be noted.

First: The hadith is not narrated from Abu Saʿid al-Khudri, neither in al-Bukhari nor anywhere else. It is actually transmitted by Saʿid ibn Abi Saʿid al-Maqburi from Abu Hurayrah. In the Dār al-Kitāb al-ʿArabī edition the name appears as “Abu Saʿid al-Maqburi,” which is a further error, for the report is through his son Saʿid from Abu Hurayrah; see Fatḥ al-Bārī 1/94.

Second: Al-Bukhari records the hadith in the Book of Faith with the wording, “Indeed, the religion is ease …” without the additional word “this.” It is al-Nasāʾi who relates it with that extra word, likewise in the Book of Faith. Ibn Ḥibbān also narrates it, and his chain is stronger, as Ibn Ḥajar clarifies in Fatḥ al-Bārī. The report has corroborating narrations, one of them from Buraydah, all of which are documented in Ẓilāl al-Jannah fī Takh­rīj Kitāb al-Sunnah, 95–97.