Some went so far in their criticism of him that Aḥmad said in al-ʿIlal wa-al-Maʿrifah (1/281/1813): “He lies; his hadith are fabricated reports. He is worthless.” In al-Tārīkh (1/1/214), al-Bukhārī referred to this statement of Aḥmad concerning him. In al-Tārīkh al-Ṣaghīr, he said: “Aḥmad declared him a liar.”

Al-Fasawī related in his Tārīkh (3/46), on the authority of ʿAlī—that is, Ibn al-Madīnī—that he said: “I have abandoned the hadith of Muḥammad ibn al-Qāsim Abū Ibrāhīm and do not narrate from him.” Ibn Ḥibbān himself said in al-Ḍuʿafāʾ (2/288): “He was one of those who narrate from trustworthy narrators reports that are not theirs, and attribute to reliable transmitters what they did not narrate. It is not permissible under any circumstances to cite him as proof or narrate from him. Ibn Ḥanbal used to call him a liar.”

I say: It is astonishing that he did not explicitly name anyone among the people of Kūfah who narrated from his shaykh, Muṭīʿ al-Ghazzāl, except this accused man! I say: Thus, he is the flaw in this hadith. As for Ibn Ḥibbān’s statement, “And the report is not authentic through another route,” this is open to question, for it has come through routes that reinforce one another, along with a supporting report in Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī. Here is the explanation:

First: from al-Barāʾ ibn ʿĀzib, who said: He then mentioned it. Al-Bayhaqī recorded it (3/198) through the route of Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī ibn Ghurāb: My father narrated to us from Abān ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Bajalī, from ʿAdī ibn Thābit, from him.