hadith was commented on by al-Athram (1), who said: “Muhammad ibn Mu‘āwiyah al-Naysābūrī, who was in Mecca, was mentioned, and I heard Abū ‘Abd Allāh say: ‘I found his hadiths to be fabricated.’ Among them, he mentioned a report from Abū al-Malīh, from Maymūn ibn Mihrān, from Ibn ‘Abbās, stating that the angels offered the funeral prayer for Adam and said ‘Allah is the Greatest’ (2) four times over him. Abū ‘Abd Allāh found this outrageous and said: ‘Abū al-Malīh was too reliable in his transmission of hadith and too mindful of Allah to narrate anything like this.’”
They also cited as evidence what al-Bayhaqī (3) narrated from ‘Utayy (4), from Ubayy, from the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him: the angels offered the funeral prayer for Adam, said ‘Allah is the Greatest’ (5) four times over him, and said: “This is your sunnah, O
(1) Recorded by al-Khatīb in Tārīkh Baghdād (4:441).
(2) مب reads: “When they offered the funeral prayer for Adam, they pronounced takbīrs.”
(3) (4:36). Also recorded by al-Tayālisī (551), Ibn Abī Shayba (11021), ‘Abd Allāh in his father’s Musnad (21240), Ibn al-Mundhir in al-Awsat (5:400), al-Tabarānī in al-Awsat (4426, 9259), al-Dāraqutnī (1813–1815), al-Hākim (1:344), al-Bayhaqī (3:404), and al-Diyā’ in al-Mukhtāra (4:19–20), through several routes from al-Hasan al-Basrī, with differing versions transmitted from him. Some routes transmit it from him, from ‘Utayy, from Ubayy ibn Ka‘b, through a chain traced to the Prophet (musnad, marfū‘); others transmit it from him as a statement of Ubayy (mawqūf); and still others transmit it from him as a mursal report (with the Companion omitted from the chain). Both the mawqūf and marfū‘ versions depend on ‘Utayy ibn Damra al-Sa‘dī, who is unknown as a narrator. Al-Albānī graded the hadith weak in al-Da‘īfa (2872, 3010). For a detailed discussion of its routes, see the annotations by the editors of al-Musnad.
It was also transmitted from al-Hasan, from Anas ibn Mālik, as a statement of Anas (mawqūf). This was recorded by al-Dāraqutnī (1816) and al-Hākim (1:385). Its chain includes Muhammad ibn al-Walīd al-Qalānisī Abū Ja‘far al-Mukharrimī, whom al-Dāraqutnī described as weak.
(4) ج reads “Ghunayy.” It appears that ص originally read “‘y,” with “kadhā” (thus) written above it, and that someone changed it to “Yahyā,” as in the other copies. All these readings are corruptions of the reading adopted here from the sources recording the report.
(5) مب reads: “When they offered the funeral prayer for Adam, they then pronounced takbīrs.”