provide a chain of transmission that can be relied upon(1). Even if it does occur in some works of Quran commentary from which(2) both authentic and weak reports are transmitted—such as the commentaries of al-Tha‘labī, al-Wāhidī, and al-Baghawī, and even those of Ibn Jarīr and Ibn Abī Hātim—the mere fact that any one of these authors narrated it is not, by scholarly consensus, proof of its authenticity. Once it is known that those transmitted reports include both authentic and weak material, it must be shown that this particular report belongs to the authentic category rather than the weak.

The most that can be said of this hadith is that it is found in some(3) works of Quran commentary containing both worthless and valuable material, as well as many fabricated and false hadiths. Yet the works of Quran commentary that contain(4) this report(5), such as(6) the commentaries of Ibn Jarīr, Ibn Abī Hātim, al-Tha‘labī, and al-Baghawī, also transmit through authentic chains reports that contradict it. For example, some commentators who mentioned this concerning the occasion for the revelation of the verse cited alongside it, through firmly established authentic chains whose authenticity scholars unanimously accept, reports that contradict it. Yet these commentators cited (7) this report in keeping with their customary practice of transmitting both authentic and weak reports narrated concerning the occasion for a verse’s revelation. For this reason, one of them will mention several views concerning the occasion for a verse’s revelation, so as to record