Al-Haythamī said in al-Majmaʿ (10/236): “Aḥmad narrated it, and its narrators are those of the Ṣaḥīḥ.”

2217 — “I do not know whether Tubbaʿ was accursed or not. Nor do I know whether Dhū al-Qarnayn was a prophet or not. Nor do I know whether the prescribed punishments are expiations or not.”

Abū Dāwūd (4674)—without the third statement—al-Ḥākim in al-Mustadrak (1/36), al-Bayhaqī (8/329), who narrated it from him, Abū al-Qāsim al-Ḥannāʾī in al-Fawāʾid (16/1), Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr in al-Jāmiʿ (2/50), and Ibn ʿAsākir in al-Tārīkh (3/251/1; 6/57/1; 11/302/1; and 16/66/2), all narrated it through ʿAbd al-Razzāq, who said: Maʿmar informed us, from Ibn Abī Dhiʾb, from Saʿīd al-Maqburī, from Abū Hurayrah, who said: The Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said the above.

Al-Ḥākim said: “Authentic according to the conditions of the two Shaykhs, and I know of no hidden defect in it.” Al-Dhahabī agreed with him, and it is as they said. Ibn ʿAsākir said: “Al-Dāraquṭnī said: ‘ʿAbd al-Razzāq alone narrated it.’”

I say: Perhaps he meant from Maʿmar; otherwise, Maʿmar was corroborated in narrating it from Ibn Abī Dhiʾb, as will follow. It was also criticized as being mursal. Al-Ḥannāʾī said immediately after it: “It is singular. Hishām ibn Yūsuf al-Ṣanʿānī narrated it from Ibn Abī Dhiʾb, from al-Zuhrī, from the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, as a mursal report; and that is more sound.” Al-Bayhaqī cited something similar from al-Bukhārī.

I say: Hishām was trustworthy, but Maʿmar differed from him, as stated above. Adam ibn Abī Iyās likewise differed from him: Ibn Abī Dhiʾb narrated to us, from al-Maqburī, with this report.