This chain is broken on this route. The sound version is that of al-Zuhrī, from Saʿīd, from him, as cited above.

His wording in this report and the one before it, “al-Khuzaʿī,” shows that he was not the forefather of the tribe but merely affiliated with it. It is therefore possible (1) that the phrase “Abū Khuzaʿah” in the narration is a copyist’s slip for “Akhū Khuzaʿah,” (2) or that his kunyah was indeed Abū Khuzaʿah; in either case the expression does not mean he was the literal progenitor of all Khuzaʿah. God knows best.

Muḥammad b. Isḥāq (3) said: Muḥammad b. Ibrāhīm b. al-Ḥārith al-Tamīmī related to me that Abū Ṣāliḥ al-Sammān told him he heard Abū Hurayrah say: I heard the Messenger of God ﷺ say to Aktham b. al-Jawn al-Khuzaʿī,

“O Aktham, I saw ʿAmr b. Luḥay b. Qamʿah b. Khindif dragging his entrails in the Fire. Never have I seen one man resemble another more than you resemble him and he resembles you.”

Aktham replied, “May my resemblance to him harm me, O Messenger of God?” He said, “No; you are a believer, whereas he was an unbeliever. He was the first to alter the religion of Ishmael: he set up the idols, slit the ear of the baḥīrah, set the sāʾibah free, paired the waṣīlah, and protected the ḥāmī. (4)(5)”

This route is not found in the canonical collections. Ibn Jarīr likewise transmitted it through Hannād, from ʿAbdah, from Muḥammad b. ʿAmr, from Abū Salamah, from Abū Hurayrah, from the Prophet ﷺ with similar wording, and that too is absent from the books.

Al-Bukhārī (6) said: Muḥammad b. Abī Yaʿqūb Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Kirmānī narrated to us; Ḥassān b. Ibrāhīm narrated to us; Yūnus narrated to us, from al-Zuhrī, from ʿUrwah, from ʿĀʾishah, who said:

The Messenger of God ﷺ declared, “I saw Hell—one part of it crushing another—and I saw ʿAmr dragging his entrails; he was the first to set free the sāʾibah.”

Al-Bukhārī alone records this version.

Al-Ṭabarānī also narrated it through Ṣāliḥ (7), from Ibn ʿAbbās, raised to the Prophet (8).

The point is that ʿAmr b. Luḥay—may Allah curse him—introduced innovations into the religion that altered the creed of the Friend (Abraham). The Arabs followed him and thereby sank into a blatant, dreadful, and heinous misguidance. Allah, exalted be He, censures them in His Noble Book in more than one place, saying:

“And do not say, with your tongues alleging falsehood, ‘This is lawful and this is forbidden,’ so that you fabricate a lie against Allah …”