That is what he said. Yet, as you can see, this Suwar does not occur in its chain of transmission, and I have not found any route for it in the Musnad other than the one I mentioned. And Allah knows best.
I then saw that al-Haythami mentioned it again elsewhere (8/187) and said: “Ahmad, al-Tabarani in al-Kabir and al-Awsat, recorded it, and Ahmad’s narrators are the narrators of the Sahih.” I say: It is found in al-Tabarani’s al-Kabir (6/160–161) through the route of Ahmad ibn al-Hajjaj, and in al-Awsat (1/288/2/4832, according to my numbering) through the route of Suwar ibn ‘Umarah al-Ramli, who said: Zuhayr ibn Muhammad narrated to us, from Abu Hazim, with it. I say: Ibn Ma‘in and Ibn Hibban (8/302) declared this Suwar trustworthy. Abu Zur‘ah al-Dimashqi said in his Tarikh (1/285 and 709): “I saw Yahya ibn Ma‘in writing before Suwar ibn ‘Umarah al-Ramli while he dictated his knowledge to him, in the year 214 AH; and Suwar died shortly thereafter.”
Zuhayr ibn Muhammad was Abu al-Mundhir al-Khurasani al-Shami, and the Syrians’ transmissions from him are weak. The ‘Abd Allah in Ahmad’s chain is the Imam Ibn al-Mubarak, who also recorded it in his book al-Zuhd (241/693).
- “The slave is your brother. When he prepares food for you, seat him with you; if he declines, then feed him, and do not strike their faces.”
Al-Tayalisi recorded it (p. 312, no. 2369), as did Ahmad (2/505), through Ibn Abi Dhi’b, from ‘Ajlan, from Abu Hurayrah, in a report attributed to the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him.