(1) The passage in brackets is omitted from N and M. (2) A reads: “al-uwal (the first ones).” (3) A and B read: “from him.” (4) The passage in brackets is omitted from N and M. (5) I previously cited the text of the hadith narrated by al-Bukhārī in his *Sahīh* (5/7), from Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya, from his father. See this book, 1/12, 308. Abū Dāwūd narrated the same hadith through the same chain, but with slight differences in wording, in his *Sunan*, 4/288 (*Kitāb al-Sunna* [Book of the Sunnah], *Bāb fī al-Tafdīl* [Chapter on Relative Merit]). In *Sunan Ibn Mājah*, 1/39 (*al-Muqaddima* [Introduction], *Bāb Fadl Umar* [Chapter on the Merit of Umar]), Abd Allāh ibn Maslama said: “I heard Alī say: ‘The best of mankind after the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—is Abū Bakr, and the best of mankind after Abū Bakr is Umar.’” In *al-Jāmi al-Saghīr*, 2/10 (Mustafā al-Halabī ed., 1358/1939), al-Suyūtī cited the hadith as follows: “The best of my community after me are Abū Bakr and Umar.” He stated that Ibn Asākir narrated it jointly from Alī and al-Zubayr. Al-Suyūtī graded the hadith *hasan* (sound), whereas al-Albānī graded it weak in *Daīf al-Jāmi al-Saghīr wa-Ziyādatihi*, 3/137. In *Musnad Ahmad*, vol. 2 (al-Maārif ed.), the hadith appears twenty-four times in closely similar wording: from Abū Juhayfa (hadiths 833, 835–837, 871, 878–880, and 1054); from Abd Khayr al-Hamdānī (hadiths 908, 909, 922, 932–934, 1030, 1031, 1040, 1052, and 1060); from Abd Khayr, from his father (hadiths 926 and 932); from Wahb al-Suwāī (hadith 834); and from Alqama ibn Qays (hadith 1051). Shaykh Ahmad Shākir—may Allah have mercy on him—graded the chains of all these hadiths authentic, except those of hadiths 922 and 1030, which he graded *hasan*, and that of hadith 1052, which he graded weak.