1988 — “Trials will overwhelm you like pieces of a dark night. The people safest from them will be a man living atop a mountain peak, subsisting on the milk of his sheep, or a man holding the reins of his horse beyond the mountain pass, earning his living by his sword.”

Al-Hakim reported it (4/514) through Abd Allah ibn Uthman ibn Khuthaym, from Nafi ibn Sarjis, from Abu Hurayrah, who said that the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said this. He 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, all being narrators of Muslim except this Nafi. Ibn Abi Hatim (4/1/453) quoted his father as saying: “I know nothing of him but good.”

1989 — “What I fear for my Ummah more than the Dajjal is the misguiding leaders.”

Ahmad reported it (5/145) through Ibn Lahiʿah, from Ibn Hubayrah, from Abu Tamim al-Jayshani, who said: I heard Abu Dharr say: “One day, I was walking alongside the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, to his home, and I heard him say this.”

I say: Its narrators are trustworthy except Ibn Lahiʿah, for he had a poor memory. As for al-Manawi’s statement, “Muslim narrated it at the end of the Sahih with the wording: ‘What I fear for you more than the Dajjal is ...’ and then mentioned a lengthy hadith,” he was referring only to the previously cited hadith of al-Nawwas ibn Samʿan, no. 482, in which the words “the misguiding leaders” do not occur.