“The Messenger of Allah (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) came out one day, alarmed and with his face flushed, saying this”—and she then related it.

988 — “No soul bears responsibility for another’s offense.”

It was recorded by Ibn Majah (2/148), who said: Muhammad ibn Abd Allah ibn Ubayd ibn Aqil narrated to us; Amr ibn Asim narrated to us; Abu al-Awwam al-Qattan narrated to us, from Muhammad ibn Jahadah, from Ziyad ibn Ilaqah, from Usamah ibn Shurayk, as a report attributed to the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace).

It says in al-Zawa’id: “Its chain of transmission is authentic. Muhammad ibn Abd Allah was listed by Ibn Hibban in al-Thiqat, and al-Nasa’i said: ‘There is nothing objectionable about him.’ Abu al-Awwam al-Qattan, whose name was Imran ibn Dawar, was deemed trustworthy by the majority; and the remaining narrators in the chain meet the criteria of the two Shaykhs.”

I say: Imran has been criticised with respect to his retention, and in al-Taqrib he is described as “truthful, but prone to error.” Thus, his hadith does not attain the rank of authentic, but is only good. This particular hadith, however, is authentic, for it has a corroborating narration from the hadith of al-Ash’ath ibn Sulaym, from his father, from a man of Banu Tha’labah ibn Yarbu’, attributed to the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) with this wording. It was recorded by al-Nasa’i (2/251) and Ahmad (5/377), and its chain is authentic; its narrators are narrators of the two Shaykhs.

It also has another corroborating narration with the wording: “Indeed, no offender bears responsibility except for his own offense …” It will come, Allah willing, under no. 1974. A third corroborating narration is: “A mother bears no responsibility for her child; a mother bears no responsibility for her child.”