First (1): Baqiyya ibn al-Walīd, foremost among narrators who conceal defects in transmission. He narrated this report using “from,” without explicitly stating that he had heard it directly.
Second: Mubashshir ibn ‘Ubayd, whose hadith are rejected.
Third: Hajjāj ibn Artāh, a weak narrator who practised concealment in transmission.
Fourth: ‘Atiyya al-‘Awfī. Al-Bukhārī said (2): “Hushaym used to criticise him.” Ahmad and others declared him weak (3).
‘Abd Allāh, the son of Imam Ahmad, said (4): “I heard my father say: ‘There was a shaykh called Mubashshir ibn ‘Ubayd who lived in Homs. I think he was from Kufa. Baqiyya and Abū al-Mughīra narrated from him. His hadith are fabricated lies.’” Al-Dāraqutnī said (5): “Mubashshir ibn ‘Ubayd is an abandoned hadith narrator; his reports have no corroborating narrations (6).”
Al-Bayhaqī said (7): “‘Atiyya al-‘Awfī cannot be relied upon as evidence. And Mubashshir ibn ‘Ubayd al-Himsī
(1) Thus in the manuscripts; similar usages occur in other works by the author.
(2) Al-Tārīkh al-Awsat (3/193).
(3) Al-‘Ilal wa-Ma‘rifat al-Rijāl (no. 1306), and al-‘Uqaylī’s al-Du‘afā’ (4/462–463).
(4) Al-‘Ilal wa-Ma‘rifat al-Rijāl (nos. 2639, 2696). The author draws here on al-Bā‘ith ‘alā Inkār al-Bida‘ wa-l-Hawādith by Abū Shāma al-Maqdisī (p. 252, Dār Majd al-Islām edition).
(5) Al-Sunan (no. 571), al-‘Ilal (no. 1339), and al-Du‘afā’ wa-l-Matrūkūn (no. 500).
(6) Al-Fiqī moved the passage “Qāla ‘Abd Allāh … yutāba‘u ‘alayhā” (“‘Abd Allāh said … are corroborated”) from here to the end of the second defect, after “al-munkar al-hadīth” (“whose hadith are rejected”), without indicating the change, as was his habit. He imagined that the flow of the text was faulty and sought to correct it, but instead corrupted it. The same occurs in the al-Risāla edition.
(7) Al-Sunan al-Kubrā (2/126), (6/281), and (1/12; 5/105; and elsewhere), respectively.