and died. The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, was asked about it, and he said: ‘Discard it and what surrounds it, and eat the rest.’”

Sufyān was told: “But Ma‘mar narrates it from al-Zuhrī, from Sa‘īd ibn al-Musayyib, from Abū Hurayrah.” He replied: “I only ever heard al-Zuhrī narrate it from ‘Ubayd Allāh, from Ibn ‘Abbās, from Maymūnah, from the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. I heard it from him repeatedly.”

‘Abdān narrated to us: ‘Abd Allāh—that is, Ibn al-Mubārak—narrated to us, from Yūnus, from al-Zuhrī, that he was asked about an animal—a mouse or some other creature—that dies in oil or clarified butter, whether solid or not. He said:

“We have been informed that the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, gave instructions concerning a mouse that had died in clarified butter: he ordered that what was close to it be discarded, and then he ate some of it.”

This was from the report of ‘Ubayd Allāh ibn ‘Abd Allāh. Al-Bukhārī then narrated it through Mālik, just as he had narrated it through Ibn ‘Uyaynah.

The transmitters narrated this hadith from al-Zuhrī with the same chain and wording as Ibn ‘Uyaynah’s version. Ma‘mar, however, was inconsistent in both its chain and its wording. On one occasion, he narrated it from Ibn al-Musayyib, from Abū Hurayrah, including the words:

“If it is solid, discard the mouse and what surrounds it; but if it is liquid, do not go near it.”

It was also reported from him:

“If it is liquid, use it as lamp fuel.”

The reports transmitted from Ma‘mar were also inconsistent. Some scholars thought that Ma‘mar’s hadith was reliably preserved and therefore acted upon it. Among those who upheld it was Muhammad ibn Yahyā al-Dhuhlī, in his compilation of al-Zuhrī’s hadiths. Ahmad likewise relied on it when he issued a fatwa distinguishing between solid