Likewise, nukhāmah—also pronounced nukhāʿah—refers to phlegm that comes up either from the head or from the chest; one says tanakhkhama and tanakhkhaʿa.

Another wording states: “Spitting (tafl) in the mosque is a misdeed, and covering it with soil is a good deed.”

This version is traced back to the Prophet through the Companion Abū Umāmah. Aḥmad narrated it, saying: “Zayd ibn al-Ḥabbāb told us; Ḥusayn ibn Wāqid told us; Abū Ghālib reported that he heard Abū Umāmah….” The chain is sound (ḥasan): all its transmitters are those of Muslim except Abū Ghālib, who is trustworthy but prone to error, as noted in al-Taqrīb. In al-Majmaʿ it says: “Aḥmad and al-Ṭabarānī in al-Kabīr also narrated it, though the latter wording is: ‘It is a sin, and its expiation is to bury it’; the men in Aḥmad’s chain are reliable.” Al-Mun­dhirī remarked, “Its chain is unobjectionable,” and Ibn Ḥajar, in Fatḥ al-Bārī, judged it “ḥasan.”

Abū Dāwūd—and, after him, al-Bayhaqī—transmitted: “al-Qaʿnabī told us; Abū Mawdūd from ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī Ḥadrad al-Aslamī, who said: ‘I heard Abū Hurayrah report from the Prophet: Whoever enters this mosque and then spits or expectorates in it, let him dig a hole and bury it; if he does not do so, let him spit into his garment and take it outside.’”

Aḥmad likewise recorded it from Zayd ibn al-Ḥabbāb and from Wakīʿ, both transmitting from Abū Mawdūd with the same sense, and Wakīʿ’s wording is: