“When food was brought to him, or when he was invited to a meal,” Anas said, “I would pick it out and place it before him, once I knew that he liked it.”

I say: Its chain of transmission is authentic, meeting the conditions of al-Bukhārī and Muslim. Aḥmad also narrated it (3/279 and 289–290), through another chain from Shuʿbah, with the wording: “He liked squash,” and in another wording: “gourd.” Its chain is likewise authentic.

Ibn Mājah narrated it (2/310–311) through Ḥumayd, from Anas, with the first wording. Its chain of transmission is authentic according to al-Bukhārī’s conditions. Abū al-Shaykh narrated it in Akhlaq al-Nabī (The Prophet’s Character) (pp. 229–231), through other chains from Anas, with both wordings. Al-Tirmidhī narrated it in al-Shamāʾil (pp. 199), through two chains from him, with the first wording. Its chain of transmission is authentic, meeting the conditions of al-Bukhārī and Muslim.

Abū Yaʿlā (3/1032), through another chain, and Ibn ʿAdī (170/1), through yet another, both narrated the second wording from Anas. Ibn Saʿd also narrated it (1/391).

2128 — “He preferred to travel on Thursday.”

Abū al-Shaykh narrated it in Akhlaq al-Nabī (The Prophet’s Character) (p. 262), as did Ibn ʿAdī (114/1), through Khālid ibn Ilyās, from Abū Salamah. Abū al-Shaykh said: “From Muḥammad ibn al-Munkadir,” from Umm Salamah, as a report attributed to the Prophet.