His statement under no. 14 reads: “…on account of the ḥadith of al-Ḥakam ibn Sufyān—or Sufyān ibn al-Ḥakam—in which he said: ‘Whenever the Prophet ﷺ passed urine, he would perform wudu and sprinkle water.’”

I say: This ḥadith is not textually sound, for it suffers from a great deal of confusion—about ten different variants, as al-Ḥāfiẓ summed up in Tahdhīb al-Tahdhīb—and even the very Companionship of al-Ḥakam ibn Sufyān is disputed.

The report, however, does have corroborating narrations, some of which I cited in Ṣaḥīḥ Sunan Abī Dāwūd, no. 159, including the narration of Ibn ʿAbbās that the Prophet ﷺ once performed wudu and sprinkled water over his private parts. It was recorded by al-Dārimī and al-Bayhaqī with a chain that is sound according to the criteria of the Two Shaykhs. Had the author chosen that report, given the strength of its isnād, or at least pointed to it, it would have been preferable.

His statement under no. 15: “It is transmitted through weak chains that he ﷺ used to say, ‘Praise be to Allah who has removed from me the filth and granted me well-being,’ and likewise, ‘Praise be to Allah who let me taste its sweetness, preserved its strength within me, and removed its harm from me.’”

I say: The expression “through weak chains” is imprecise with respect to the actual status of these two ḥadiths. The first comes from Abū Dharr and from Anas, and both versions appear in Irwāʾ al-Ghalīl, no. 53, with two weak isnāds. The second is from Ibn ʿUmar and is listed in al-Ṣaḥīḥah al-Ḍaʿīfah, no. 4187.

I treated the issue in detail in al-Aḥādīth al-Ḍaʿīfah, no. 5658, showing that the report of Abū Dharr contains anonymity, confusion, and variations in wording.

Moreover, saying “through weak chains” may give the impression that each of the two reports has multiple routes, prompting the reader to think of the principle that a weak ḥadith can be strengthened by numerous chains. One might then assume that this is what the author intends by his phrase “through weak chains,” whereas, for the reasons just mentioned, he most likely did not mean that.