I add: Al-Ṭabarānī also narrated this ḥadith in al-Muʿjam al-Ṣaghīr, p. 207, with the chain: “Muḥammad ibn Dāwūd ibn Aslam al-Ṣudafī of Egypt told us; Aḥmad ibn Saʿīd al-Madanī al-Fihrī told us; ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ismāʿīl al-Madanī told us, from ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Zayd ibn Aslam….” This isnād is obscure, for everyone below ʿAbd al-Raḥmān is unknown. Ḥāfiẓ al-Haythamī hinted at this when he stated in Majmaʿ al-Zawāʾid 8/253: “Al-Ṭabarānī recorded it in al-Awsat and al-Ṣaghīr, and there are narrators in it whom I do not know.”

I say: Such a remark is insufficient, for it may mislead the uninformed into thinking that none of them is actually censured, which is not the case. The report hinges on ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Zayd ibn Aslam. Al-Bayhaqī observed that he alone carried this narration, and he is accused of fabrication; al-Ḥākim himself leveled this charge against him. For that reason the scholars repudiated al-Ḥākim’s authentication of the report and ascribed it to error and inconsistency. Thus the heir to the learning of the Companions, the Followers, and the leading Imams, Shaykh al-Islām Ibn Taymiyyah1 (may Allah have mercy on him), said in al-Qāʿidah al-Jalīlah, p. 89:

“Al-Ḥākim’s inclusion of this ḥadith is one of the matters for which he was criticized, for he himself said in al-Madkhal ilā Maʿrifat al-Ṣaḥīḥ min al-Saqīm: ‘ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Zayd ibn Aslam transmitted from his father forged reports; anyone versed in the craft can readily see that the blame lies with him.’”2

I continue: As for ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Zayd