734 – ʿĀʾishah (may Allah be pleased with her) related: “I said, ‘Messenger of Allah, So-and-so has just received a shipment of coarse cloth from Syria. If only you would send word to him so that you might take two garments from him on deferred payment until a time of ease.’ He did send to the man, but the latter refused.” Al-Ḥākim and al-Bayhaqī recorded this report, and its transmitters are trustworthy. (1)

Hadith grading: The narration is sound (ṣaḥīḥ).

Imām Aḥmad also transmitted it, saying: “Muḥammad ibn Jaʿfar told us; Shuʿbah told us from ʿImārah—meaning ibn Abī Ḥafṣah—from ʿIkrimah from ʿĀʾishah, who said: ‘So-and-so brought him some cloth; send to him so that he may sell you two garments on deferred payment until ease.’ The Prophet ﷺ therefore sent to him, whereupon the man said, ‘I know what Muḥammad wants; he only means to abscond with my two garments—that is, he will not pay me my silver.’ When this reached the Prophet ﷺ he said, ‘He has lied. They know full well that I am the most God-fearing among them,’ or he said, ‘the truest in speech and the most faithful in keeping trusts.’ Al-Ḥākim also declared the report sound, and al-Dhahabī endorsed his judgment.

The author remarks: all of its narrators are reliable.

Vocabulary:
• “So-and-so”: a miserly Jew hostile to Islam and its Messenger, known as “Halīq”; such a curt response is typical of that corrupt Jewish faction.
• “baz”: (with fatḥah on the bāʾ and shaddah on the zāy) a type of heavy cloth.
• “nasīʾah”: deferred payment, postponing the hand-over of the price.