“(I am soon to be summoned and will respond, and) I have left among you that which, if you hold fast to it, you will never go astray after me: the two weighty matters, one greater than the other—the Book of Allah, a rope extended from heaven to earth, and my progeny, the members of my Household. Indeed, they shall never part until they come to me at the Pond.”

It was narrated by Aḥmad (3/14, 17, 26, and 59), Ibn Abī ʿĀṣim (1553 and 1555), al-Ṭabarānī (2678–2679), and al-Daylamī (2/1/45). Its chain of transmission is good as corroborative evidence. It has further corroborating reports: from Abū Hurayrah, recorded by al-Dāraquṭnī (p. 529), al-Ḥākim (1/93), and al-Khaṭīb in al-Faqīh wa-al-Mutafaqqih (56/1); from Ibn ʿAbbās, recorded by al-Ḥākim, who deemed it authentic, and al-Dhahabī concurred with him; and from ʿAmr ibn ʿAwf, recorded by Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr in Jāmiʿ Bayān al-ʿIlm (2/24, 110). Although their individual chains are not free from weakness, some of them strengthen others; the best of them is the hadith of Ibn ʿAbbās.

I then found a strong corroborating report for it in the hadith of ʿAlī, attributed to the Prophet. Al-Ṭaḥāwī recorded it in Mushkil al-Āthār (2/307) by way of Abū ʿĀmir al-ʿAqdī: “Yazīd ibn Kathīr narrated to us, from Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar ibn ʿAlī, from his father, from ʿAlī,” attributing it to the Prophet with the wording: “...the Book of Allah in your hands, and the members of my Household.” Its narrators are trustworthy, apart from Yazīd ibn Kathīr, whom I could not identify. Most likely, his name was corrupted by the printer or copyist. And Allah knows best.

It then occurred to me that perhaps the name had been transposed by one of them, and that the correct name was Kathīr ibn Zayd. I was then certain of this after returning to the biographical works on narrators, where I found that they mentioned him among the teachers of ʿĀmir al-ʿAqdī and among those who narrated from Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar ibn ʿAlī. So praise be to Allah for His enabling grace.