I say: Makḥūl differed from him, narrating it from Kathīr ibn Murrah directly from the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, as a mursal report.
Al-Bayhaqī recorded it and said: “This is a sound mursal report,” as did al-Mundhirī. Al-Lālakā’ī recorded it (1/102/1) from ʿAṭā’ ibn Yasār, Makḥūl, and al-Faḍl ibn Faḍālah, through differing chains that stop with them. Such reports have the same ruling as a report attributed to the Prophet, since this is not something that can be stated on the basis of mere opinion.
Al-Ḥāfiẓ Ibn Rajab said in Laṭā’if al-Maʿārif (p. 143): “There are several hadiths concerning the virtue of the night of mid-Shaʿbān, concerning which scholars have differed. Most declared them weak, while Ibn Ḥibbān authenticated some of them and included them in his Ṣaḥīḥ. Among their best is the hadith of ʿĀ’ishah, who said: ‘I could not find the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, …’” —the hadith.
- As for the hadith of ʿĀ’ishah, Ḥajjāj narrated it from Yaḥyā ibn Abī Kathīr, from ʿUrwah, from her, attributed to the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, with the wording: “Allah, Most High, descends to the lowest heaven on the night of mid-Shaʿbān and forgives more people than the number of hairs on the sheep of Kalb.”
It was recorded by al-Tirmidhī (1/143), Ibn Mājah (1389), al-Lālakā’ī (1/101/2), Aḥmad (6/238), and ʿAbd ibn Ḥumayd in al-Muntakhab min al-Musnad (194/1; photocopy held in the library). It includes the account of ʿĀ’ishah’s finding the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, absent one night. Its narrators are trustworthy, but Ḥajjāj—who is Ibn Arṭā’ah—practised tadlīs and related it using an ambiguous “from” formulation. Al-Tirmidhī said: “I heard Muḥammad”—meaning al-Bukhārī—“declare this hadith weak.”
In sum, the hadith is undoubtedly authentic when all these routes are considered together. Authenticity may be established by fewer routes than these, provided they are free of serious weakness—as is the case with this hadith. Thus, what Shaykh al-Qāsimī—may Allah have mercy on him—reported in Iṣlāḥ al-Masājid (p. 107) on the authority of the scholars of narrator accreditation and criticism, namely that there is no authentic hadith concerning the virtue of the night of