“A mudd suffices for minor ablution, and a saʿ suffices for the ritual bath.”
I say: This is a sound chain of transmission. All its narrators are trustworthy and are among Muslim’s narrators, despite Muʿawiyah ibn Hisham al-Qassar al-Kufi having weak retention. However, he was not alone in narrating it. Ahmad (3/264) said: Muʿawiyah ibn ʿAmr narrated to us; Zaʾidah narrated to us from Sufyan, with this wording, except that he said, “Jabr ibn ʿAbdullah narrated to me,” thus reversing the name. Rather, it is ʿAbdullah ibn Jabr, who was his grandfather, for he was ʿAbdullah ibn ʿAbdullah ibn Jabr—or Jabir ibn ʿAtik al-Ansari—as stated in al-Tahdhib. Zaʾidah was Ibn Qudamah al-Thaqafi, and Muʿawiyah ibn ʿAmr was Ibn al-Muhallab al-Azdi. Both were trustworthy narrators of the two Shaykhs; thus, the hadith is authentic according to their conditions.
- As for the hadith of Ibn ʿAbbas, it is narrated by ʿAbd al-ʿAziz ibn ʿAbd al-Rahman al-Balasi, from Khusayf, from ʿIkrimah, from him, in a report attributed directly to the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him. Al-Tabarani recorded it in al-Awsat (p. 37) and said: “No one narrated it from Khusayf except ʿAbd al-ʿAziz.” I say: Imam Ahmad regarded him as suspect. Therefore, reliance rests upon the preceding reports.
Note: Al-Manawi declared al-Tirmidhi’s narration (hadith no. 3) defective, saying in Fayd al-Qadir: “It contains ʿAbdullah ibn ʿIsa al-Basri, concerning whom al-Kashif states: ‘They declared him weak.’” I say: This is an error. Rather, he is ʿAbdullah ibn ʿIsa ibn ʿAbd al-Rahman al-Ansari, a trustworthy narrator among the narrators of the two Shaykhs. Moreover, Sufyan—namely, al-Thawri—corroborated him, as mentioned above. Thus, his statement in al-Taysir, “Its chain of transmission is weak,” is another error.