Kurayb: Muʿāwiya ibn Hishām narrated to us, from ʿImrān ibn Abī Anas al-Makkī, from Ibn Abī Mulayka, with the same report.

ʿImrān al-Makkī is Ibn Anas, not Ibn Abī Anas; rather, his teknonym is Abū Anas. He is therefore ʿImrān ibn Anas, Abū Anas al-Makkī—the man whose biographical entry states that he narrated from Ibn Abī Mulayka and that Muʿāwiya ibn Hishām narrated from him. Accordingly, the original reading in the Musnad must have been either “ʿImrān ibn Anas” or “ʿImrān, Abū Anas.” This establishes that my earlier supposition was correct and that the assertion that “its transmitters are transmitters of the Sahīh” is incorrect. It appears that they mistook him for ʿImrān ibn Abī Anas al-ʿĀmirī al-Madanī, who is trustworthy and one of Muslim’s narrators. But it is not he, for Abū Yaʿlā’s version explicitly identifies him as “the Meccan.” This man is weak, as stated above. He, rather than the trustworthy narrator, is the one who narrated from Ibn Abī Mulayka; and Muʿāwiya ibn Hishām narrated from him, rather than from the trustworthy narrator.

I then found the hadith in al-Shuʿab (1/301/2), where he narrates it from Yahyā ibn Wādih, who said: “ʿAmmār ibn Anas narrated to us,” with the same report.

Yahyā ibn Wādih was also listed among those who narrated from ʿImrān al-Madanī, but he was not listed among those who narrated from ʿImrān al-Makkī.

All of this confirms the view I preferred: that the narrator of this hadith is none other than ʿImrān ibn Anas, Abū Anas al-Makkī, and that he is weak.

One matter remains: in al-Bayhaqī’s chain, too, “ʿAmmār” appears in place of “ʿImrān,” just as it did in Ibn Abī Hātim’s aforementioned chain. If this is not a copyist’s error—which I consider unlikely—then perhaps he was called both “ʿImrān” and “ʿAmmār,” though I have not seen anyone mention this. Allah knows best.

I then saw that al-Bayhaqī said after the hadith: