Example of the mutābaʿa (1): al-Shāfiʿī narrates in al-Umm (2), from Mālik, from ʿAbd Allāh ibn Dīnār, from Ibn ʿUmar, that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, “The month is twenty-nine days, so do not begin the fast until you sight the crescent and do not break it until you sight it; if it is obscured from you, then complete the number as thirty.”

Because of this exact wording, some scholars (3) supposed that al-Shāfiʿī alone had transmitted it from Mālik and therefore counted it among his singular reports, since Mālik’s other students transmitted the same chain with the wording, “If it is obscured from you, fa-qdurū lahū (4)” (5)—“then reckon for it.” Yet we have found a corroborator for al-Shāfiʿī: ʿAbd Allāh ibn Maslamah al-Qaʿnabī. Al-Bukhārī likewise recorded it (6) from him on the authority of Mālik, and this constitutes a complete mutābaʿa.

We have also located a partial mutābaʿa in Ṣaḥīḥ Ibn Khuzaymah (7)(8): through the narration of ʿĀṣim ibn Muḥammad, from his father Muḥammad ibn Zayd, from his grandfather ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUmar, with the wording, “fa-kammilū thalāthīn” — “then make it thirty.”

And in Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, from the narration of ʿUbayd Allāh (9) ibn ʿUmar (10),