Fudayl, from ʿAbd Allāh (1) ibn Saʿīd, from his grandfather, from Abū Hurayrah, from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): “When one of you prostrates, let him place his knees before his hands, and let him not kneel as a male camel kneels.” Al-Athram also narrated it in this form in his Sunan (2), from Abū Bakr.
Another report has also been narrated from Abū Hurayrah, from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), which corroborates this and agrees with the hadith of Wāʾil ibn Hujr. Ibn Abī Dāwūd said (3): Yūsuf ibn ʿAdī narrated to us: Ibn Fudayl narrated to us, from ʿAbd Allāh (4) ibn Saʿīd, from his grandfather, from Abū Hurayrah, that when the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) prostrated, he would place his knees before his hands.
(1) All witnesses except ق, مب, and ن read “‘Ubayd Allāh.”
(2) Ibn Qudāma cites it from him in al-Mughnī (2:194), as does al-Hāfiz in Fath al-Bārī (2:291), who judges its chain of transmission weak. The author of ‘Awn al-Ma‘būd (2:89) responds to the claim of inverted wording by noting that this hadith has two chains of transmission, both containing ‘Abd Allāh ibn Sa‘īd, whom Yahyā al-Qattān, Ibn Ma‘īn, Ahmad, Abū Ahmad al-Hākim, Abū Zur‘a, Abū Hātim, and Ibn ‘Adī deemed weak. He then states: “Because of their weakness, neither provides any evidence whatsoever for the alleged inversion.” Al-Albānī states in al-Irwā’ (2:79): “This is an invalid hadith narrated solely by ‘Abd Allāh—that is, Ibn Sa‘īd al-Maqburī—who is extremely unreliable; indeed, some accused him of lying. … The most charitable assumption about this accused narrator is that he intended to say, ‘Let him place his hands before his knees,’ as in the authentic hadith, but inadvertently reversed the wording and said, ‘His knees before his hands.’”
(3) Al-Tahāwī reports it from him in Sharh al-Ma‘ānī (1:255). Its chain includes ‘Abd Allāh ibn Sa‘īd al-Maqburī, who is weak. See the preceding documentation of the hadith’s sources.
(4) ك reads “‘Ubayd Allāh,” a scribal error.