well.
Yet it is necessary to present some examples to confirm his assault on the authentic Sunnah, which also extended to the hadiths previously cited in this volume. Their numbers are: (545—Muslim—and 563, 569, 580, 596, 629, 686, 718, 764—al-Bukhari—and 908, 919, 922, 927, 938, 943, 946, 954).
As for hadith 569, he—may Allah guide him—challenged it on the grounds that there was a break between Zurarah ibn Awfa and Abdullah ibn Salam, even though Zurarah explicitly stated that he heard it from him. Yet he cast doubt upon it, saying (p. 528):
“I do not think it is sound, and Allah knows best. I do not know from whom the error came: Ibn Abi Shaybah or Abu Usamah?!”
He says this while knowing that Ibn Abi Shaybah was the trustworthy hadith master and author of al-Musannaf, and that Abu Usamah was Hammad ibn Usamah, a trustworthy and precise narrator. Al-Bukhari cited this very narration of Ibn Abi Shaybah in his Tarikh (2/1/439) as proof that Zurarah heard from Ibn Salam, and reinforced it with another narration, saying: “Sulayman narrated from Hammad, who said: ‘Zurarah narrated to us; he said: Abdullah ibn Salam narrated to us.’” This is an authentic chain of transmission with a continuous chain. Sulayman was Ibn Harb, and Hammad was Ibn Zayd; both were trustworthy narrators whose reports were included by al-Bukhari and Muslim. Then al-Bukhari narrated through an authentic chain from Zurarah: “Tamim al-Dari narrated to me.” Tamim died three years before Ibn Salam. So where is the error, O you who are steeped in error and deception?!
Accordingly, the scholars unanimously declared this hadith authentic. Al-Tirmidhi, al-Baghawi, al-Hakim, and al-Dhahabi explicitly authenticated it, while al-Mundhiri, al-Nawawi, and al-Hafiz Ibn Hajar endorsed them. Yet he concealed this from his readers in order to give them the impression that he had no opposing evidence! Indeed, he did this with every hadith that he declared weak. One example is hadith 93 in his al-Da'ifah: “No one sends salutations upon me ...” When he cited Ibn al-Qayyim’s discussion in Jala al-Afham (p. 19), concerning Ibn Taymiyyah’s criticism of it, he did not mention that Ibn al-Qayyim said: “The chain of transmission of this hadith has been authenticated.” This is contrary to the way of Ahl al-Sunnah: when refuting the followers of innovation, they mention what is in their favor and what is against them, then clarify what is correct, as