“I do not know Maḥmūd ibn Jābir; I know Muḥammad ibn Jābir ibn ʿAbd Allāh.” I say: As for Ibn Ḥibbān, he included them both among the reliable narrators in al-Thiqāt (3/232 and 258), in accordance with his well-known criterion.
2305 — “Whoever learns the first seven surahs of the Quran is a scholar.”
It was narrated by Aḥmad (6/73 and 82), Ibn Naṣr in Qiyām al-Layl (p. 69), al-Ṭaḥāwī in Mushkil al-Āthār (2/153–154), al-Ḥākim (1/564), al-Wāḥidī in al-Wasīṭ (2/123/2), and al-Khaṭīb (10/108), through the route of ʿAmr ibn Abī ʿAmr, the client of al-Muṭṭalib, from Ḥabīb ibn Hind al-Aslamī, from ʿUrwah ibn al-Zubayr, from ʿĀʾishah, as a Prophetic report. Al-Ḥākim said: “Its chain of transmission is authentic,” and al-Dhahabī concurred with him.
I say: Regarding Ḥabīb ibn Hind, Ibn Abī Ḥātim said (1/2/110): “ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Bakr, ʿAmr ibn ʿAmr, and Ibn Ḥarmalah narrated from him.” He mentioned neither any criticism nor accreditation concerning him. Al-Bukhārī did likewise (1/2/327). Ibn Ḥibbān included him among the reliable narrators in al-Thiqāt (4/141 and 6/177). Thus, the hadith is good, or close to that. And Allah knows best.
Note: Ḥabr—also pronounced ḥibr—means “scholar.” This is how it appears in the sources cited above, except for Mushkil al-Āthār and al-Mustadrak, where it appears as khayr, with the dotted letter khāʾ. It likewise appears in al-Jāmiʿ al-Ṣaghīr, attributed to al-Ḥākim and al-Bayhaqī in al-Shuʿab; al-Manāwī commented on it accordingly. And Allah knows best.
Benefit: What is meant by “the first seven” is the seven long surahs at the beginning of the Quran, together with their respective numbers of verses:
- al-Baqarah (286),