Aḥmad also said:
Ḥasan ibn Mūsā narrated to us(1); Zuhayr narrated to us; ʿĀṣim al-Aḥwal narrated to us, from Abū ʿUthmān, who said:
“A letter from ʿUmar—may Allah be pleased with him—reached us while we were in Azerbaijan:
‘O ʿUtbah ibn Farqad,(2) beware of luxury, the dress of the idolaters, and the wearing of silk. For the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—has forbidden us to wear silk and said, “Except for something like this,” whereupon the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, raised two of his fingers for us.’”(3)
This ḥadīth satisfies the conditions set by the two Ṣaḥīḥs.(4)
It further indicates that ʿUmar—may Allah be pleased with him—ordered the wearing of the maʿaddiyyah, which is the traditional dress of the descendants of Maʿad ibn ʿAdnān, namely the Arabs; the term maʿaddiyyah is thus traced back to Maʿad. He forbade the attire of the non-Arabs and of the polytheists, and this, as is obvious, is a general injunction. The same has already been cited with a marfūʿ chain, and Allah knows best.
Imām Aḥmad likewise relates in the Musnad:
Al-Aswad ibn ʿĀmir narrated to us,(6) Ḥammād ibn
(1) Al-Hasan ibn Musa al-Ashyab, Abu Ali, a Baghdadi who later served as judge of Mosul and other cities. Classified as trustworthy and belonging to the ninth generation of narrators; all six canonical collections transmit his reports. He died in 229 AH/844 CE. See: Taqrib al-tahdhib 1:171, no. 323.
(2) The eminent Companion Utbah ibn Farqad ibn Yarbuʿ ibn Habib al-Sulami fought at Khaybar and took part in two further expeditions with the Messenger of Allah. ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab appointed him to lead one of the conquest armies; he captured Mosul, then settled and died in Kufa. See: al-Isabah 2:455, no. 5412.
(3) Musnad Ahmad 1:16, under the Musnad of ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab. The report has corroborating chains in both Sahih collections, as noted below.
(4) A shortened corroboration appears in al-Bukhari, Book of Dress, “Men Wearing Silk,” hadiths 5828–5830 (Fath al-bari 10:284); also in Muslim, Book of Dress, chap. 2, hadith no. 2069, versions 12–13 (36/1642).
(5) The word zi (attire) is omitted in manuscript A.
(6) Al-Aswad ibn Amir al-Shami, nicknamed Shadhan, Abu ʿAbd al-Rahman. Declared reliable by Ibn al-Madini and others; his narrations appear in all six canonical books. He died in 208 AH/823 CE. See: Khulasat al-tadhhib, p. 37.