I say: This is a mursal report with an authentic chain of transmission. Abu Dawud also narrated it in al-Marasil, to which al-Hafiz attributed it. Perhaps he narrated it by way of Ibn Abi Shaybah, for the printed edition of al-Marasil has its chains omitted. Yet it contains Abu Dawud’s statement following the hadith (p. 48): “It is transmitted with a connected chain, but it is not authentic.” By Allah, I do not know the basis for this rejection, when we have already cited it through the narration of his shaykh, Imam Ahmad, with its authentic chain—and he himself narrated from him (1)!

Ibn Abi Shaybah and al-Khattabi, in Maʿalim al-Sunan (5/353), then narrated by another route from al-Hasan, who said: “The counter-charm is a form of sorcery.” Its chain is good. Nushrah is an incantation. Al-Khattabi said: “Nushrah is a type of incantation and treatment used to treat one who is thought to be possessed by jinn.”

I say: He means unlawful incantations: those that are not drawn from the Quran and the authentic sunnah. They are the ones to which the designation of associationism has been applied in more than one hadith. Some of these have already preceded; see, for example, 331 and 1066. Associationism may be concealed in certain words whose meanings are unknown, or encoded in disconnected letters, as may be seen in some talismans produced by certain charlatans.

Al-Bukhari’s suspended report from Qatadah is to be understood as referring to lawful incantations. Qatadah said: I said to Saʿid ibn al-Musayyib: “A man afflicted by ṭibb—meaning sorcery—or prevented from his wife: is it permissible