Ighathat al-Lahfan (Relief for the Distressed), which the aforementioned man undertook to publish and for whose hadiths he provided source documentation; yet he corrupted it most grievously—more than he had previously done to Imam al-Nawawi’s book Riyad al-Salihin (The Gardens of the Righteous)! What is intended here, however, is to expose his ignorance and excess in declaring this authentic chain weak. I therefore say: In his “Dialogue,” he impugned it on the grounds of a break between Mahasir ibn Habib and al-Irbad ibn Sariyah, even though he himself cited (pp. 57–58) Abu Hatim and Ibn Hibban as stating that Mahasir narrated from a number of the Companions. Abu Hatim mentioned among them Abu Tha'labah al-Khushani, and Ibn Hibban, Asad ibn Kurz. Yet he does not accept the judgment of these two hadith masters, and on p. 59 categorically asserts that Mahasir did not hear from them, on the basis that he adopted the view of certain early scholars that proof of an actual meeting is a condition, rather than mere contemporaneity.

Although this condition is not accepted by Imam Muslim or by the great majority of hadith scholars and jurists, as is well known from the books of hadith methodology, upon careful examination it is a condition of completeness, not a condition of validity, as I demonstrated in the introduction to the refutation mentioned above. Yet this criminal against the Sunnah was not content with adopting that view—had he been, the matter would have been somewhat less serious—but went further, requiring proof of direct hearing between the two narrators even where their meeting had in principle been established. On this basis, he declares many authentic hadiths weak. I have demonstrated his adherence to this condition, which none of the imams—not even al-Bukhari—maintains, through examples I cited in that introduction.

The point is that the man has departed from the scholarly mainstream, both in principle and in application; thus his objections carry no weight whatsoever. Nor is it surprising that his judgments differ from those of our scholars. Here is an example, both in principle and in application: he impugned the reports of Mahasir from the three Companions mentioned above, including Asad ibn Kurz, on the grounds of a break that invalidates authenticity. Yet al-Hafiz Ibn Hajar graded the chain of Mahasir’s hadith from Asad ibn Kurz as good, in the latter’s biographical entry in al-Isabah,