and he is Ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Qāḍī; Muslim cited him in a corroborating report. It is further supported by the hadith of Ḥumayd, who said:

“Anas ibn Mālik was asked, ‘Did the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, dye his hair?’ He replied, ‘He had no more than about seventeen or twenty gray hairs at the front of his beard.’”

Ibn Mājah also reported it, as did Aḥmad (3/108) and Ibn Saʿd (1/431). I say: Its chain of transmission is authentic according to the criteria of the two Shaykhs.

Thābit also narrated it, saying: Anas was asked, “Did the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, turn gray?” He replied: “Allah did not mar him with gray hair. There were only seventeen or eighteen hairs on his head and in his beard.” Ibn Saʿd reported it with an authentic chain of transmission according to the criteria of Muslim, and al-Ḥākim likewise declared it authentic (2/608).

Rabīʿah ibn Abī ʿAbd al-Raḥmān related that he heard Anas ibn Mālik say: “The Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, died with fewer than twenty white hairs on his head and in his beard.” It was reported by the two Shaykhs and others, as cited in Mukhtaṣar al-Shamāʾil (no. 1).

2097 — “His speech was clear and decisive, understood by everyone who heard it.”

Abū Dāwūd (2/293), al-Nasāʾī in ʿAmal al-Yawm wa-al-Laylah (412 and 413), and Aḥmad (6/138) reported it from Sufyān, from Usāmah, from al-Zuhrī, from ʿUrwah, from ʿĀʾishah, attributed to the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. Ibn Saʿd (1/375) and Aḥmad as well (6/257) also reported it through Rūḥ ibn ʿUbādah: Usāmah ibn Zayd informed us of a similar report. I say: This is a good chain of transmission. Its narrators are trustworthy and are narrators of Muslim, except for Usāmah ibn Zayd—the al-Laythī—who has some weakness in his retention. Al-Ḥāfiẓ said: