entered the Kaʿbah and offered no prayer?’ He replied, ‘On the contrary, he prayed two rakʿahs beside the two front pillars, then pressed his back against them.’

Al-Ṭaḥāwī records the report through the route of ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muslim ibn Hurmuz from him.

This ʿAbd Allāh was graded weak by Aḥmad, Ibn Maʿīn, al-Nasāʾī, and others.

As for ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn al-Rajjāj, I have found no information on him. Al-Haythamī quotes the hadith in Majmaʿ al-Zawāʾid with similar wording and remarks: “Al-Ṭabarānī narrated it in al-Kabīr; in the chain is ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn az-Zajjāj—so spelled with a zāy, whereas al-Ṭaḥāwī has it with a rāʾ—and I located no biographical entry for him.”

I say: Perhaps Ibn Ḥajar al-ʿAsqalānī identified him, for he stated, “Al-Ṭabarānī produced it with a good chain.”

What complicates the matter is that the isnād runs through Ibn Hurmuz, whom Ibn Ḥajar himself labeled weak in Taqrīb al-Tahdhīb. It remains possible that al-Ṭabarānī transmitted it by another route. Allah knows best.

Among the supporting narrations is that of ʿUthmān ibn Ṭalḥah:

“The Prophet ﷺ entered the House and prayed two rakʿahs facing you as you come in, between the two pillars.”

Al-Ṭaḥāwī, Aḥmad, and al-Ṭabarānī in al-Kabīr all relate it through the chain of Ḥammād ibn Salamah, from Hishām ibn ʿUrwah, from his father, from him.

This isnād is strong, as Ibn Ḥajar affirmed, and its transmitters are those relied upon by Muslim.