more than one collection (1).”’”
(* Al-Dāraqutnī was asked about him and said: “An evil man.” Abū al-Faraj said: “Ibn Mardawayh also narrated it through Dāwūd ibn Farāhīj, from Abū Hurayrah.” He said: “Dāwūd is weak; Shu‘bah declared him weak. *)” (2).
I say: None of these men can be relied upon as evidence even in matters less consequential than this.
As for the second incident, at Babylon, there is no doubt that this is a lie (3). Al-Himyarī’s recitation of poetry provides no evidence, for he did not witness it. The lie is an old one: he heard it and put it into verse. Those given to excess in praise and blame compose verse about things whose truth has not been established, and al-Himyarī in particular is known for such excess (4).
Al-Bukhārī and Muslim both related in their Sahīh collections that Abū Hurayrah said:
“One of the prophets went on a military expedition and said to his people: ‘Let no man accompany me who has contracted marriage with a woman and wishes to consummate it but has not yet
(1) Al-Mawdū‘āt: “We have confirmed this conduct of his in the case of more than one shaykh in Kufa.”
(2) The passage between the two asterisks appears in al-Mawdū‘āt, but its arrangement and some of its wording differ. This fabricated hadith also appears in Tanzīh al-Sharī‘a, 1:378–382; al-La’āli’ al-Masnū‘a, 1:336–338; and al-Fawā’id al-Majmū‘a, p. 350.
(3) (n), (m): “that it is a lie.”
(4) Abū Hāshim—or Abū ‘Āmir—Ismā‘īl ibn Muhammad ibn Yazīd ibn Rabī‘a ibn Mufrigh al-Himyarī was a Rāfidī (rejectionist) poet born in 105 AH. His date of death is disputed: 173, 178, or 179 AH. Ibn Hajar said of him: “He was a vile Rāfidī.” Al-Dāraqutnī said: “He used to revile the salaf (early Muslim generations) in his poetry and praise ‘Alī—may Allah be pleased with him.” Al-Shahrastānī counted him among the Mukhtāriyya-Kaysāniyya, followers of al-Mukhtār ibn Abī ‘Ubayd al-Thaqafī, who held that Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya was the imam after ‘Alī—may Allah be pleased with him. For his biography and doctrinal affiliation, see Lisān al-Mīzān, 1:436–438; Fawāt al-Wafayāt, 1:32–36; al-Bidāya wa-l-Nihāya, 10:173–174; Rawdāt al-Jannāt, pp. 29–31; al-A‘lām, 1:320–321; and al-Milal wa-l-Nihal, 1:133–134.