Al-Ḥajjāj ibn Arṭāh practised tadlīs and transmitted it with an ambiguous “from” formulation. Nūḥ ibn Abī Maryam, however, narrated it from him as a connected report, saying: from him, from Ṭalḥah ibn Muṣarrif, from Kurayb, from Ibn ʿAbbās, attributed to the Prophet, with the same wording. Abū Nuʿaym recorded it in The Adornment of the Saints (5/29). This is one of Nūḥ’s errors—or one of his fabrications—for he was a liar.

The phrase, “Indeed, Allah is Generous and loves generosity,” has also been narrated in the report of Saʿd and others. Its sources are given in The Muslim Woman’s Hijab (101).

1628 — “I am only a conveyer, while Allah guides; and I am a distributor, while Allah gives. Whoever receives something from me with worthy aspiration and sound conduct, that is what will be blessed for him; but whoever receives something from me with evil aspiration and bad conduct is like one who eats but is never satisfied.”

Aḥmad recorded it (4/101–102): Abū al-Mughīrah narrated to us; Ṣafwān narrated to us; Abū al-Zāhiriyyah narrated to us, from Muʿāwiyah ibn Abī Sufyān, attributed to the Prophet. This is an authentic chain of transmission; all its narrators are trustworthy and are among Muslim’s narrators. ʿAbd al-Quddūs corroborated him, saying: Ṣafwān informed us of it. Al-Bukhārī recorded it in The History (4/1/10).

Al-Suyūṭī attributed it to al-Ṭabarānī in The Major Collection, from Muʿāwiyah, with similar wording but without the words, “Whoever receives …” Its commentator, al-Manāwī, said: “Al-Haythamī said: ‘He narrated it through two chains of transmission, one of which is good.’”

I say: Al-Bukhārī also recorded it in The History through the route of Ṣafwān and Fuḍayl ibn Faḍālah, from Abū Hazzān ʿAṭiyyah ibn Rāfiʿ, from Muʿāwiyah, attributed to the Prophet, with the wording: “I am only a conveyer, while Allah guides; and I am only a distributor, while Allah gives.”