later scholars explained and refuted his weakening of the hadith on that basis, such as the meticulous scholar Ibn al-Qayyim in Tahdhīb al-Sunan (5/270–272), the hadith master Ibn Hajar in al-Fatḥ, and others. I have discussed this in detail in a treatise I have prepared in refutation of Ibn Hazm’s aforementioned epistle. May Allah facilitate its final preparation and publication.

Despite his learning, virtue, and intelligence, Ibn Hazm was not broadly versed in hadiths, their chains of transmission, and their narrators. One indication of this is his declaring this hadith weak and his describing Imam al-Tirmidhi, the compiler of the Sunan, as “unknown.” This was among the reasons that the eminent scholar Muhammad ibn ʿAbd al-Hadi—a student of Ibn Taymiyyah—said in his biographical entry in Mukhtaṣar Ṭabaqāt ʿUlamāʾ al-Ḥadīth (p. 401):

“He was often mistaken when discussing the authentication and weakening of hadith, and the circumstances of narrators.”

I say: Therefore, his statements concerning hadith should not be accepted until their soundness has been verified and their freedom from anomaly established. The same applies to his distinctive jurisprudence and to speculative theology, in which he opposed the Salaf. Ibn ʿAbd al-Hadi said the following after describing him as possessing “great intelligence and extensive learning”:

“But it became clear to me that he was a staunch Jahmite. He affirmed the meanings of only a few of Allah’s Most Beautiful Names, such as al-Khāliq (the Creator) and al-Ḥaqq (the Truth). As for the remaining names, according to him they indicated no meaning whatsoever, such as al-Raḥīm (the Merciful), al-ʿAlīm (the All-Knowing), and al-Qadīr (the All-Powerful). Rather, for him knowledge was power, and power was knowledge; the two were identical with the Essence. Knowledge did not indicate anything additional to the bare Essence whatsoever. This is sheer sophistry and obstinate denial. Ibn Hazm had engaged in logic and philosophy and immersed himself deeply in them; consequently, false concepts became entrenched in his mind.”