ʿAbd Allāh al-Muzanī related that he heard Ibn ʿAbbās say—while the two of them were seated beside the Kaʿbah—“The Prophet ﷺ arrived on his riding beast with Usāmah behind him. We brought him a vessel containing nabīdh; he drank from it and then gave the remainder to Usāmah. He said, ‘You have done well and shown courtesy; continue to do so.’ Ibn ʿAbbās concluded, ‘For that reason we have no wish to alter what the Messenger of Allah ﷺ commanded.’

In another version[1] transmitted by Bakr, a Bedouin asked Ibn ʿAbbās, ‘Why do I see your cousins serving milk and honey, whereas you offer nabīdh? Is it because you are in need, or because you are being stingy?’ Ibn ʿAbbās replied to him with this very report.

Imām Aḥmad[2] narrated: ‘Rūḥ told us; Ḥammād told us, from Ḥumayd, from Bakr, from ʿAbd Allāh, that a Bedouin said to Ibn ʿAbbās, “How is it that the family of Muʿāwiyah give water mixed with honey, the family of so-and-so serve milk, yet you offer nabīdh? Is it miserliness on your part or need?”’

Ibn ʿAbbās answered, ‘We are neither miserly nor needy. Rather, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ came to us with Usāmah ibn Zayd riding behind him, asked for a drink, and we served him from this’—meaning the nabīdh kept at the Siqāyah—‘and he drank from it and said, “You have done well; keep on doing so.”’

Aḥmad[4] also recorded the report through Rūḥ and Muḥammad ibn Bakr, from Ibn Jurayj, from Ḥusayn ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUbayd Allāh ibn ʿAbbās and Dāwūd ibn ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAbbās, from Ibn ʿAbbās, and mentioned the same incident.

He likewise transmitted[5]—through Isḥāq ibn Shāhīn[6], from Khālid (i.e., Khālid al-Ḥadhdhāʾ), from ʿIkrimah, from Ibn ʿAbbās—that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ came to the Siqāyah and asked for a drink. Al-ʿAbbās said, ‘O Faḍl, go to your mother and bring the Messenger of Allah ﷺ a drink from her.’ The Prophet replied, ‘Give me to drink!’ Al-ʿAbbās said, ‘O Messenger of Allah, people have been putting their hands in it.’ He answered, ‘Give me to drink,’ and so he drank from it. He then went to Zamzam while they were serving the water and working there and said, ‘Carry on, for you are engaged in a righteous task.’ He added, ‘Were it not that you would be overwhelmed by the crowds, I would come down and place the rope on this’—meaning his shoulder, and he pointed to it.

Aḥmad also has[9] the narration of ʿĀṣim, from al-Shaʿbī, in which Ibn ʿAbbās said, ‘I served the Prophet ﷺ water from Zamzam and he drank it standing.’ ʿĀṣim added, ‘ʿIkrimah swore that on that occasion he was on a camel’—in another wording, ‘on his she-camel.’