Note: The commentator on Ṣifat al-Jannah (1/160) said: “This is a weak chain of transmission. Al-Aʿmash practised tadlīs and here narrates it with an ambiguous ‘from’ formula. Here, he is not narrating from the likes of Abū Ṣāliḥ al-Sammān, Ibrāhīm al-Nakhaʿī, and Abū [sic] Wāʾil, for his transmissions from such narrators are regarded as connected. See al-Mīzān (2/224).”

I say: The answer is twofold. First, al-Dhahabī’s statement does not restrict this to those shaykhs alone, since he mentioned them merely by way of example, saying: “such as Ibrāhīm and…” Second, al-Bukhārī accepted al-Aʿmash’s ambiguous transmission from Abū Ẓabyān, for he cited another hadith from Ibn ʿAbbās through this same chain, no. 4706.

2189 — “There is no zakah due on horses or slaves, except for zakat al-fitr due on slaves.”

Abū Dāwūd (1/253), and through him al-Bayhaqī (4/117), narrated it from ʿAbd al-Wahhāb: ʿUbayd Allāh narrated to us from an unnamed man, from Makḥūl, from ʿIrāk ibn Mālik, from Abū Hurayrah, attributed to the Prophet. This is a weak chain of transmission because the unnamed man is unknown.

ʿAbd al-Wahhāb—namely, Ibn ʿAbd al-Majīd al-Thaqafī, who is trustworthy and appears among the narrators of the two Ṣaḥīḥs—was contradicted in his chain. Yaḥyā ibn Zakariyyā ibn Abī Zāʾidah contradicted him, saying: ʿUbayd Allāh ibn ʿUmar informed me from Abū al-Zinād, from al-Aʿraj, from Abū Hurayrah, with the same wording. Al-Khaṭīb (14/114) and al-Bayhaqī narrated it, and the latter said: “This is how it was narrated from ʿUbayd Allāh through this chain.” He then cited the first chain from ʿAbd al-Wahhāb and said: “This is the more correct version. His hadith from Abū al-Zinād is not preserved, and Makḥūl did not hear it from…”