Ibn Mājah said:
“I heard Abū al-Ḥasan al-Ṭanāfisī say: I heard ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Muḥāribī say, ‘This ḥadīth ought to be handed over to the instructor so that he may teach it to the children in the kuttāb.’” Here ends the wording of Ibn Mājah.

A confusion has crept into the isnād of this ḥadīth. I have written it exactly as I found it in one copy; the Successor has been omitted—namely ʿAmr ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥaḍramī, Abū ʿAbd al-Jabbār al-Shāmī, who narrates it from Abū Umāmah.

Our shaykh, the ḥadīth master al-Mizzī, said in “al-Aṭrāf”: “Ibn Mājah also related it in the Book of Trials, through ʿAlī ibn Muḥammad, from ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad al-Muḥāribī, from Abū Rāfiʿ Ismāʿīl ibn Rāfiʿ, from Abū Zurʿah al-Saybānī, Yaḥyā ibn Abī ʿAmr (1), from Abū Umāmah in its entirety.” Such were his words. Sahl ibn ʿUthmān likewise transmitted it from al-Muḥāribī—and that is a flagrant error (2).

I say: Abū Dāwūd produced a sounder chain, narrating it from ʿĪsā ibn Muḥammad, from Ḍamrah, from Yaḥyā ibn Abī ʿAmr al-Saybānī, from ʿAmr ibn ʿAbd Allāh, from Abū Umāmah—parallel to the ḥadīth of al-Nawwās ibn Samʿān (3).

Imām Aḥmad has also transmitted a single ḥadīth with this very chain in his “Musnad.” Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ʿAbd Allāh, the son of Imām Aḥmad, said: “I found in my father’s notebook, written in his own hand: ‘Mahdī ibn Jaʿfar al-Ramlī narrated to me—Ḍamrah narrated to us—from al-Saybānī, whose name is Yaḥyā ibn Abī ʿAmr—from ʿAmr ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥaḍramī—from Abū Umāmah, who said:

“The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said:
‘A group from my community will continue to be manifest upon the truth, overpowering their enemy. Those who oppose them will not harm them, save whatever hardship befalls them, until the command of Allah comes while they remain in that state.’

They asked, ‘O Messenger of Allah, where will they be?’
He replied, ‘In Bayt al-Maqdis and the environs of Bayt al-Maqdis.’” (4)’”

Muslim said: ʿAmr al-Nāqid, al-Ḥasan al-Ḥulwānī and ʿAbd ibn Ḥumayd narrated to me—with similar wording, the version that follows being that of ʿAbd. He said: ʿYaʿqūb—that is, Yaʿqūb ibn Ibrāhīm ibn Saʿd—narrated to us; my father narrated to us, from Ṣāliḥ, from Ibn Shihāb; ʿUbayd Allāh ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUtbah informed me that Abū Saʿīd al-Khudrī said:

The Messenger of Allah ﷺ once told us at length about the Dajjāl. Among the things he related was this:
“He will come, yet it will be forbidden for him to enter the mountain passes of Madinah. He will stop at one of the salt flats adjoining the city, and on that day a man—who will be the best of people, or among the best—will go out to him and say, ‘I bear witness that you are the Dajjāl about whom the Messenger of Allah ﷺ spoke to us.’
“The Dajjāl will say, ‘What do you think? If I kill this man and then bring him back to life, will you doubt the matter?’
“They will say, ‘No.’”
He said: “So he will kill him, then—”