11 – Ibn ʿUmar (may Allah be pleased with them both) reported that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: “Two dead creatures and two kinds of blood have been made lawful for us. The two dead creatures are locusts and fish, and the two kinds of blood are the liver and the spleen.” Recorded by Aḥmad and Ibn Mājah, and its chain is weak. (1)

Hadith grading
The report is sound when it is mawqūf (stopping with Ibn ʿUmar). As for the version traced back to the Prophet (marfūʿ), it is weak, because it is transmitted by ʿAbd al-Raḥmān and his two brothers, the sons of Zayd ibn Aslam, from their father, from Ibn ʿUmar, and Ibn Maʿīn declared them unreliable. Abū Zurʿah and Abū Ḥātim considered the narration mawqūf, and it was judged sound in that form by al-Dāraquṭnī (4/271), al-Ḥākim, al-Bayhaqī (1/254), and Ibn al-Qayyim. Ibn Ḥajar stated that it carries the ruling of a marfūʿ narration, for a Companion’s words “It was made lawful for us…” or “It was made unlawful for us…” are like his saying “We were commanded to…” or “We were forbidden from…,” so this report can be used as evidence because it is tantamount to a marfūʿ hadith.

Vocabulary of the hadith
• maytatān (ميتتان, “two dead creatures”): the singular is maytah in its lighter form; when pronounced with a doubled consonant (mayyitah) it refers to an animal that died of itself or was slaughtered in an un-prescribed manner. Ibn Daqīq said that in actual usage both forms convey the same meaning.
• damān (دمان, “two kinds of blood”): the singular is dam (blood). What is meant here is not the flowing blood that circulates from the heart through the arteries to all parts of the body and returns to the heart via the veins—a fluid that would be yellow were it not for the red corpuscles—and which is impure and forbidden. Rather, what is intended here