Preface

In the name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Bestower of Mercy.

All praise is due to Allah. We praise Him, seek His help, and ask His forgiveness. We seek refuge in Allah from the evil within ourselves and from the consequences of our misdeeds. Whomever Allah guides, none can lead astray; and whomever He allows to stray, none can guide. I bear witness that there is no deity worthy of worship except Allah alone, without partner, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His servant and Messenger.

To proceed: My brother, Professor Zuhayr al-Shāwish—the proprietor of al-Maktab al-Islāmī and a man of generous contributions to the publication of ḥadīth works and the reports of the early generations—requested that I undertake the scholarly verification of Imām al-Nawawī’s Riyāḍ al-Ṣāliḥīn, annotate it, trace the sources of the ḥadīths that require it, and point out the slight weakness that exists in some of them, for scarcely any selected compilation, such as this one, is completely free of it—let alone other books that combine authentic and weak reports and the like.

During the course of this verification a number of matters came to my attention. I have noted as many of them as possible in the commentary, while other benefits remain. I deemed it necessary to address those in this introduction, and so I say: