al-Ṣāmit, and through this chain of al-Ḥasan he said:
“Ahmad narrated it with several wordings, while al-Ṭabarānī narrated it in abridged form. In some of its routes the wording is, ‘There is no obedience to any created being when it involves disobedience to the Creator,’ and the narrators in Ahmad’s chain are the narrators of the Ṣaḥīḥ.”
For the version attributed to the Prophet there is another route, shortened, with the wording:
“There is no obedience when it involves disobedience to Allah, Mighty and Majestic.”
180 – “There is no obedience when it involves disobedience to Allah, Mighty and Majestic.”
It was recorded by Ahmad (4/426, 427, 436) and likewise by al-Ṭayālisī (850) from Qatādah, who said: “I heard Abū Marayah al-ʿUjailī say, ‘I heard ʿImrān ibn Ḥuṣayn relate from the Prophet – peace and blessings be upon him – that he said…,’” and he mentioned it.
I say: Its narrators are trustworthy – the narrators of the two Ṣaḥīḥs – except for this Abū Marayah, whom Ibn Ḥibbān listed among the reliable narrators in al-Thiqāt.
Al-Haythamī also cited it (5/226) with this wording on the authority of both ʿImrān and al-Ḥakam ibn ʿAmr, saying: “It was narrated by al-Bazzār and al-Ṭabarānī in al-Kabīr and al-Awsaṭ, and the narrators in al-Bazzār’s chain are the narrators of the Ṣaḥīḥ.”
Al-Suyūṭī included it in al-Jāmiʿ al-Kabīr (3/13/1) with al-Ṭabarānī’s wording, attributing it to Ahmad, Ibn Jarīr, Ibn Khuzaymah, al-Ṭabarānī in al-Kabīr, and Ibn Qāniʿ – all on the authority of ʿImrān ibn Ḥuṣayn together with al-Ḥakam ibn ʿAmr al-Ghifārī – as well as to Abū Nuʿaym in his Muʿjam and al-Khaṭīb from Anas, al-Shīrāzī in al-Alqāb from Jābir, and al-Ṭabarānī in al-Kabīr from al-Nawwās ibn Samʿān.
I say: This referencing shows an obvious degree of leniency, for you have seen that this exact wording is not found with Ahmad or al-Ḥākim; rather, it appears only with al-Ṭabarānī, as al-Haythamī made clear. I do not know whether the rest of the sources to whom it has been attributed actually contain this very wording or only something similar.