from Ibn ʿAbbas, who said: I entered upon my maternal aunt Maymunah and Khalid ibn al-Walid. Maymunah said, “O Messenger of Allah ﷺ, shall I not feed you some of what my brother from the desert has given me as a gift?” She then brought forward two roasted lizards on a palm stalk. The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, “Eat, for it is not the food of my people; I find myself averse to it.” Ibn ʿAbbas and Khalid ate from it, whereupon Maymunah said, “I will not eat food from which the Messenger of Allah ﷺ has not eaten.”

The Messenger of Allah ﷺ then asked for a drink, and a vessel of milk was brought to him. He drank, with Ibn ʿAbbas on his right and Khalid ibn al-Walid on his left. The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said to Ibn ʿAbbas, “Will you permit me to give Khalid a drink?” Ibn ʿAbbas replied, “I would not wish to give anyone preference over myself with respect to what remains of the Messenger of Allah’s ﷺ drink.” Ibn ʿAbbas then took it and drank, and Khalid drank. The Messenger of Allah ﷺ then mentioned the hadith.

I say: His shaykh, Muhammad ibn Ishaq, was Muhammad ibn ʿAmr ibn ʿUmar, Abu al-Hasan al-Qurashi, the muezzin known as Ibn al-Haris—as it appears in al-Tarikh, with an r—who was Hisham ibn ʿAmmar’s son-in-law. Ibn ʿAsakir included his biography (15/31/1–2), transmitting from a number of trustworthy authorities who narrated from him, including Abu al-Hasan ibn Jawsa, al-Tabarani, and others. He died in 288 AH, and no critical or favorable evaluation of him was mentioned.

The narrators above him are deemed trustworthy among the narrators of al-Tahdhib, provided that Ibn Ziyad is Muhammad al-Alhani. But if he is ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Ziyad ibn Anʿum al-Ifriqi, then he has weakness in his memory; thus, someone like him may be used as supporting evidence, especially since he is paired with Ibn Jurayj. Were it not for the fact that the latter—I mean Ibn Jurayj—practised tadlis and narrated it using an ambiguous “from” formulation, he alone would have constituted sufficient proof, were it not that Ibn ʿAyyash—namely Ismaʿil of Homs—is weak when narrating from non-Syrians. Ibn Jurayj was Meccan, and ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Ziyad was African, unlike al-Alhani, who was Syrian. Thus, if the latter is intended in this chain of transmission, Ibn ʿAyyash is then a reliable authority.

In sum, at the very least it is suitable for corroboration because Ibn Ziyad is mentioned in it, if he is the African; otherwise, it is independently probative if he is al-Alhani. For Ibn Majah has transmitted it in his Sunan (2/314): Hisham ibn ʿAmmar narrated to us; Ismaʿil ibn ʿAyyash narrated to us; Ibn Jurayj narrated to us.