into graves, and do not turn my grave into a recurring festival. Send blessings upon me, for your blessings reach me wherever you may be.”

This chain of transmission is ḥasan (good), for all of its narrators are reputable and well-known. The only point of reservation concerns ʿAbd Allāh b. Nāfiʿ al-Ṣāʾigh, the Madinan jurist and companion of Mālik, whose narrations show a degree of leniency that does not undermine his ḥadīth.

Yahyā b. Maʿīn said, “He is reliable—and Ibn Maʿīn’s endorsement should suffice you.”
Abū Zurʿah remarked, “There is no harm in him.”
Abū Ḥātim al-Rāzī commented, “He is not a ḥāfiẓ and is somewhat lenient; his memorization is sometimes affirmed and sometimes questioned.”

These remarks merely lower his reports from the rank of ṣaḥīḥ (sound) to ḥasan (good). No one disputes his upright character or his grasp of jurisprudence, and accuracy predominates in his narrations even though he may occasionally err. This particular ḥadīth is among those reliably preserved from him; it is not disapproved, for it deals with a Medinan practice essential to his legal scholarship—something a jurist would be careful to retain.

The ḥadīth also enjoys supporting chains independent of his route, having been transmitted through several other isnāds, so it can no longer be deemed anomalous. Indeed, every clause of this narration has reached us from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) through well-known chains. Our sole purpose in citing it here is to highlight the prohibition against treating his grave as a festival.