summoned al-Shifāʾ and said, “Show it to me.” She presented it to him, and he approved it—then the rest of the report was mentioned.
Al-Ḥākim commented, “Authentic according to the criteria of the two Shaykhs,” and al-Dhahabī concurred.
I say: Ibrāhīm ibn Saʿd has been corroborated by ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, yet the latter differs from him in both the chain of narration and the wording.
-
As for the chain, he narrates: from Ṣāliḥ ibn Kaysān, from Abū Bakr ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Sulaymān ibn Abī Ḥathmah, from al-Shifāʾ bint ʿAbd Allāh—omitting Ismāʿīl ibn Muḥammad ibn Saʿd.
-
As for the wording, he relates:
“The Prophet ﷺ came in while I was with Ḥafṣah and said to me, ‘Will you not teach her the ruqyah for namlah (a certain skin lesion) just as you taught her writing?’”
In this version there is no mention of her reciting the ruqyah before him ﷺ or of his instructing her to perform it, and you will soon see—if Allah wills—how critical that omission is for a correct understanding of the ḥadith.
This variant was recorded by Aḥmad (6/372), Abū Dāwūd (2/154), al-Ṭaḥāwī in Sharḥ Maʿānī al-Āthār (2/388), and al-Nasāʾī as cited in al-Sakhāwī’s Fatāwā Ḥadīthiyyah (81/2), as well as by al-Shawkānī in Nayl al-Awṭār (8/176).
The first narration is stronger for two reasons.
First: Ibrāhīm ibn Saʿd is more reliable in memorization than his counterpart ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn ʿUmar, for although both