Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz related it with an uninterrupted series of explicit declarations of direct hearing. Ibn ʿAsākir recorded it, and Aḥmad (4/216) recorded it from al-Walīd alone.
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ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-Wāḥid narrated it from Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz with the same uninterrupted series. Ibn ʿAsākir recorded it.
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Muḥammad ibn Sulaymān al-Ḥarrānī said: “Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz informed us,” explicitly stating that ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī ʿUmayrah heard it directly from the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him. Ibn ʿAsākir recorded it.
I say: These are five routes from Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, and all of them are reliable Syrian narrators. Ordinarily, it is unlikely that they all heard it from him after he had become confused. It seems that for this reason al-Ḥāfiẓ did not find fault with it on account of that confusion. In Ibn Abī ʿUmayrah’s biographical notice in al-Iṣābah, he said: “The hadith has no hidden defect other than inconsistency, for its narrators are reliable. Al-Walīd ibn Muslim and ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-Wāḥid narrated it from Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz in a manner differing from Abū Mushir regarding his shaykh. They said: ‘From Saʿīd, from Yūnus ibn Maysarah, from ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī ʿUmayrah.’ Ibn Shāhīn recorded it through Maḥmūd ibn Khālid from both of them. Likewise, Ibn Qāniʿ recorded it through Zayd ibn Abī al-Zarqāʾ from al-Walīd ibn Muslim.”
I say: Ibn ʿAsākir also recorded this narration of al-Walīd through another route from him. However, the narration previously cited from him and from ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-Wāḥid, which conforms to Abū Mushir’s narration, is stronger than their narration that differs from his—especially since Marwān ibn Muḥammad al-Dimashqī and Muḥammad ibn Sulaymān al-Ḥarrānī corroborated it, as mentioned above. For this reason, al-Ḥāfiẓ Ibn ʿAsākir said: “The view of the majority is correct.” If this is so, then the inconsistency alleged by al-Ḥāfiẓ Ibn Ḥajar—assuming it is conceded—