in Tārīkh Dimashq (13/196/2): “In my view, they are one and the same man.”

He then cited evidence for this from reports and the statements of leading hadith critics. Al-Hāfiz Ibn Hajar concurred with him in al-Tahdhīb; whoever wishes may consult both works. He died before 60 AH.

As for Abū al-Aswad, he was apparently al-Dīlī—also called al-Du’alī—the Basran judge. His name was Zālim ibn ‘Amr, and he died in 69 AH.

Abū al-Zāhiriyyah was Hudayr ibn Kurayb. He narrated from Hudhayfah, Abū al-Dardā’, and others among the Companions and Successors. He died in 128 AH, though it is also said that he died in 100 AH.

Ibn Wahb’s name was ‘Abd Allāh. He was an Egyptian and one of Imām Ahmad’s teachers.

Yūnus was Yūnus ibn ‘Abd al-A‘lā al-Sadafī, the Egyptian, one of Muslim’s teachers.

This chain of transmission presented a difficulty to the distinguished scholar Mahmūd Muhammad Shākir, who wrote in his commentary on Tafsīr al-Tabarī (9/580):

“There is a problem with this chain of transmission. Its apparent meaning is that Abū al-Zāhiriyyah narrated the report from Abū al-Aswad, from ‘Umayr ibn al-Aswad. This is impossible, for Abū al-Zāhiriyyah narrates directly from Abū al-Dardā’. I strongly suspect that there is an omission or lacuna at this point in the manuscripts of the Tafsīr...”

I say: There is neither an omission nor anything impossible about it. Rather, this is a case of Successors narrating from one another, something well known and firmly established in the two Sahīh collections and elsewhere. Indeed, a chain may contain as many as six or seven successive Successors—the highest number found in reports transmitted by Successors from one another—as al-Hāfiz stated in Sharh al-Nukhbah (p. 17).

43 — (Because the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said: “Treat them in the same manner as the People of the Book.”)