It is said that, had ʿAbd Allāh b. Zayd not been ill on that day, the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—would have appointed him as the muʾadhdhin.¹
Saʿīd b. Manṣūr relates in his Sunan:
Abū ʿAwānah narrated to us, from Mughīrah, from ʿĀmir al-Shaʿbī, that the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—was greatly concerned about the prayer; the signs of that concern were evident upon him. Among the matters that weighed on him was his mention of the bell, after which he said, “That belongs to the practice of the Christians.” He then thought of sending men through the streets to announce the prayer, but he said, “I dislike to occupy men with calling others to prayer and thereby distract them from their own prayer.” He also spoke of the dream of ʿAbd Allāh b. Zayd.
(1) See Sunan Abi Dawud, Book of Prayer, chapter “The Inception of the Adhan,” hadith no. 498, 1/335–37.
(2) Waddah ibn Abdullah al-Yashkuri al-Wasiti al-Bazzar, known as Abu Awana. Ibn Hajar writes: “reliable, firmly grounded, of the seventh generation.” All six canonical compilers narrate from him; he is the author of the Musnad and died in 176 AH. See Taqrib al-Tahdhib, 2/331, no. 33.
(3) Al-Mughira ibn Miqsam al-Dabbi, their mawla, Abu Hisham, a jurist of Kufa. Ibn Maʿin, al-ʿAjli, al-Nasaʾi, Ibn Saʿd and others declared him trustworthy, though he practiced tadlis (concealing a narrator’s source). Ibn Hajar cites this from Ibn Fadl. He died in 136 AH. See Tahdhib al-Tahdhib, 10/269–70, no. 482.
(4) ʿAmir ibn Sharahil al-Shaʿbi, the famous imam. Ibn Hajar says: “trustworthy and well-known, an excellent jurist, of the third generation; Makʿhul said, ‘I have not seen anyone more learned than he.’” He died in 103 AH at the age of eighty. See Taqrib al-Tahdhib, 1/387, no. 46.
(5) In the printed edition: bi-amr al-salat (“concerning the prayer”).
(6) In the printed edition: liyatabayyana (“so that it become clear”).
(7) The word an (“that”) is absent from manuscripts J and D.
(8) In the printed edition: faʿala (“did”).
(9) I could not locate it in the published portion of the Sunan of Saʿid ibn Mansur.