Third:

If these hadiths were truly narrated by the Companions and the Followers, where is any mention of them among the Companions and Followers? Who transmitted them from them? In what book is it stated that they narrated them? Anyone familiar with what transpired among them knows as a matter of necessity that these hadiths were concocted by liars who came after them and were the work of their own hands.

Fourth:

It may be said: Our knowledge that the Emigrants and the Helpers were Muslims who loved Allah and His Messenger, that the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) loved them and was loyal to them, and that Abū Bakr was the leader after the Messenger of Allah (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) is far more certain than any knowledge that one of these hadiths is authentic.

How, then, can what we know with certainty through mass transmission be rejected on the basis of reports so paltry and contemptible that they do not even deserve to be called solitary reports, and for which no truthful transmitter is known? Rather, hadith scholars agree that they rank among the most egregious fabrications. For this reason, not one (of them) is found in the authoritative hadith books(1); indeed, all the leading hadith scholars categorically declare them false.

(The fifth approach)(2): The Quran testifies in more than one passage to Allah’s pleasure with them and His praise of them, as in His words, Exalted is He:

“The first and foremost among the Emigrants and the Helpers, and those who followed them with excellence—Allah is pleased with them, and they are pleased with Him.”

(Surah al-Tawbah: 100).