Report 45: ʿAbd Allāh narrated to us, saying, “My father narrated to me; Abū ʿAbd al-Ṣamad al-ʿAmmī narrated to us; Mālik ibn Dīnār narrated to us, from al-Ḥasan, that:

‘The Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—never satisfied his hunger for bread and meat except when eating in company (ʿalā ḍafaf).’

Mālik added, ‘I did not know what “ḍafaf” meant, so I asked a Bedouin, and he said, “It is a pure Arabic word—by Allah!—referring to a group of people gathering over food and all of them partaking of it together.”’