ʿUqbah—brother of Qabīṣah—who narrated it from Hamzah al-Zayyāt and Sufyān al-Thawrī, from Zubayd, with the additional wording found in his version. He added at its end: “For they are words sent on ahead, words that ward off evil, and words that follow; and they are the enduring righteous deeds.”

Al-Bayhaqī transmitted it in Shuʿab al-Īmān (1/348–349), through al-Ḥākim, from Mihrān ibn Hārūn ibn ʿAlī al-Dāwūdī, who said: Sufyān ibn ʿUqbah narrated to us ... Its chain likewise meets Muslim’s criteria, apart from this Mihrān, for I was unable to find any biographical notice for him.

On consulting al-Mustadrak, however, it became clear that two narrators had been omitted from Shuʿab al-Īmān between Ibn ʿUqbah and Mihrān. Hamzah al-Zayyāt was Ibn Ḥabīb, the Qur’an-reciter. He was truthful, though he sometimes erred, and was among Muslim’s narrators. Thus, he constitutes a strong corroboration of al-Thawrī, if the chain to him is authentic; hence, the principal reliance is upon the narration of ʿĪsā ibn Yūnus.

However, Muḥammad ibn Kathīr, in al-Bukhārī’s al-Adab al-Mufrad (275), and ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Mahdī, in al-Marwazī’s Ziyādāt al-Zuhd (1134), differed from him: they narrated it from Sufyān, from Zubayd, as attributed to the Companion. Zuhayr also corroborated them, saying: Zubayd narrated it to us in the same manner. Abū Dāwūd transmitted it in al-Zuhd (164/157). Muḥammad ibn Ṭalḥah likewise corroborated them, narrating it from Zubayd as attributed to the Companion. Al-Ṭabarānī transmitted it in al-Muʿjam al-Kabīr (8990), and its chain is authentic. Al-Haythamī said (10/90): “Its narrators are the narrators of the Ṣaḥīḥ.”