He therefore regarded it as reprehensible.
I asked, “On the authority of the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace?”
He replied, “Yes, on the authority of the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace.”
When a Successor (tābiʿī) gives a legal ruling on the basis of a ḥadīth he himself transmits, this shows that, in his view, the report is firmly established.
Nonetheless, sound chains also relate from ʿAṭāʾ that he considered letting the garment hang unobjectionable and that he would pray while doing so. Perhaps this was before the ḥadīth reached him and he retracted once he learned of it, or perhaps he forgot the report. The question is well known: does a narrator’s acting contrary to his own narration undermine that narration?
The prevailing opinion reported from Aḥmad and the majority of scholars is that it does not, for the discrepancy can be attributed to factors other than a weakness in the ḥadīth itself.
ʿAbd al-Razzāq has also transmitted—from Bishr ibn Rāfiʿ, from Yaḥyā ibn
(1) Al-Bayhaqi cites the report in al-Sunan al-Kubra (2:242). He gives it with a continuous chain from Sulayman al-Ahwal, from Ataʾ, from Abu Hurayrah, with wording identical to that found in Abu Dawud and al-Hakim, and also with a broken chain in the version of Hushaym. He remarks, “Although this isnad is interrupted, it nevertheless reinforces the connected chain cited just before it.” See likewise: ʿAbd al-Razzaq, al-Musannaf (1:365), no. 365, which reproduces Hushaym’s wording through Maʿmar, from ʿAmir al-Ahwal, from Ataʾ.
(2) In MS Ṭ the text reads: “when he is led in prayer.”
(3) Abu Dawud reports that Ibn Jurayj said, “The practice I witnessed most from Ataʾ was that he prayed with his garment hanging loose (sadl),” Sunan Abi Dawud (1:424), no. 644. Al-Bayhaqi relates the same and comments, “We have transmitted that Ataʾ ibn Abi Rabah prayed with his garment hanging loose; perhaps he forgot the hadith, or interpreted the prohibition as applying only to someone who does it out of arrogance, whereas he was not acting arrogantly—Allah knows best,” al-Sunan al-Kubra (2:242). ʿAbd al-Razzaq likewise records in al-Musannaf that Ibn Jurayj said, “I saw Ataʾ let his garment hang down while praying,” al-Musannaf (1:362), no. 1408.
(4) The printed edition reads: “in his narration.”
(5) The word anna (“that”) is omitted in MS B.