2723 — “He forbade urinating at the doors of mosques.”

Ibn Shabbah recorded it in Tārīkh al-Madīnah (1/36) through Ibn Jābir, who said that he heard Makhūl—may Allah be pleased with him—say it, attributing it to the Prophet. I say: Its chain of transmission is authentic; its narrators are reliable and are among Muslim’s narrators, except that it is mursal, since Makhūl was a Syrian Successor.

However, it has corroboration in the mursal report of Abū Mijlaz—that is, Lāḥiq ibn Ḥumayd, who said: The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, instructed ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb—may Allah be pleased with him—not to allow anyone to urinate on the qiblah side of the mosque. Ibn Shabbah also recorded it, and its chain of transmission is likewise authentic.

Abū Dāwūd likewise recorded these two mursal reports in al-Marāsīl (3) and (14). Al-Suyūṭī attributed them only to that work in al-Jāmiʿ al-Ṣaghīr. However, he cited the second of them with the wording: “He forbade urinating on the qiblah side of the mosque.” Al-Manāwī criticized this, saying: “Abū Dāwūd’s wording from Abū Mijlaz is: ‘The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, instructed ʿUmar to forbid urinating on the qiblah side of the mosque.’”

I say: This is indeed its wording in Abū Dāwūd’s al-Marāsīl, printed under this title (p. 4). In reality, however, it is Mukhtaṣar al-Marāsīl, since the chains of transmission have been omitted from it, as have the texts themselves; among them is this hadith of Makhūl, which is not found in it. Now, after examining the two chains of transmission of the hadith and finding that both are authentic as mursal reports,