Al-Baghawī likewise reports this on the authority of al-Rabīʿ ibn Anas, al-Kalbī, and Abū ʿAmr ibn al-ʿAlāʾ.

I say: It is also narrated from Muʿāwiyah that a man once said to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, “O son of the two who were offered in sacrifice,” whereupon the Messenger of Allah ﷺ laughed. (1)

This was the position adopted by ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz and by Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq ibn Yasār as well. Al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī used to say, “There is no doubt about this.”

Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq related—from Buraydah ibn Sufyān ibn Furwah al-Aslamī, from Muḥammad ibn Kaʿb—that Muḥammad ibn Kaʿb told them he once brought the matter up to ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz while he was Caliph and the two of them were in Syria, citing as proof the verse, “So We gave her good news of Isaac, and after Isaac, Jacob” (Hūd 11:71). (2) ʿUmar replied, “I had never reflected on this before, but I now see it exactly as you have said.” He then summoned a man who was living in Syria—formerly a Jew who had become Muslim, whose Islam was sound, and who was regarded as one of their scholars.

ʿUmar asked him, while Muḥammad ibn Kaʿb was present, (3) “Which of Abraham’s two sons was he commanded to sacrifice?” The man answered, “By Allah, it was Ishmael, O Commander of the Believers. The Jews know this perfectly well, but they envy you Arabs that your forefather was the one whose affair with Allah took this course and to whom Allah ascribed merit for his patience. So they deny it and claim that it was Isaac, for Isaac is their forefather.” (4)

We have treated this question exhaustively, with its proofs and transmitted reports, in our Tafsīr; all praise and favor belong to Allah. (5)

The Birth of Isaac

Allah the Exalted says: “And We gave him good news of Isaac, a prophet, one of the righteous. And We blessed him and Isaac; and among their descendants are those who do good and those who clearly wrong themselves.” (al-Ṣāffāt 37:112–113)