1591 — “The Dajjal will emerge from a land in the East called Khorasan, followed by people whose faces are like hammered shields.”

It was narrated by al-Tirmidhi (3/234), Ibn Majah (2/506), al-Hakim (4/527), Ahmad (1/4 and 7), and al-Diya in al-Mukhtarah (33–37, in my critical edition), through Abū al-Tayyāḥ, from al-Mughīrah ibn Sabīʿ, from ʿAmr ibn Ḥurayth, from Abū Bakr al-Siddiq, who said: The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, told us this, and then mentioned it. Al-Tirmidhi said: “A good, singular hadith.”

Al-Hakim said: “Its chain of transmission is authentic,” and al-Dhahabi concurred with him.

I say: It is as they both said. Its narrators are trustworthy and are narrators of the two Sahihs, apart from al-Mughīrah ibn Sabīʿ, who is nevertheless trustworthy. ʿAmr ibn Ḥurayth was a young Companion. Abū al-Tayyāḥ’s name was Yazīd ibn Ḥumayd al-Dubaʿī.

Note: This is the wording of the hadith in all the sources we have cited. Al-Suyūṭī mentioned it in al-Ziyādah ʿalā al-Jāmiʿ al-Saghīr with the wording: “...from the direction of the East, from a city called ...” He said: “Ahmad and Ibn Majah narrated it from Abū Bakr!” Yet this wording has no basis in either of their works, nor in those of any of the others we have cited—except in one narration of al-Diya, which reads: “The Dajjal will emerge from a village called Khorasan.”

I say: In my view, this wording is anomalous, since it contradicts all those who narrated it with the wording given in the heading: “a land in the East called Khorasan.” Allah knows best.