to undermine al-Marwazī’s chain on grounds of obscurity, and the chain of Muḥammad ibn al-Faraj on the grounds that it was merely good. Nor did he stop there; he even cast doubt on its being good, saying: “But the chain from al-Ismāʿīlī to him still requires examination. If any of its narrators has been criticized, then so be it; otherwise, he is truthful, and his chain is apparently good!” This explicitly shows that he had not examined al-Ismāʿīlī’s chain; otherwise, he would have examined it and would not have imagined something contrary to the facts regarding it. He supposed that there was a number of narrators between him and Muḥammad ibn al-Faraj, whereas in fact there was only his shaykh, al-ʿAbbās ibn Aḥmad al-Washshāʾ, between them. He was one of the righteous shaykhs devoted to the study of the Quran. Three trustworthy hadith masters narrated from him: this al-Ismāʿīlī, al-Khaṭīb, and Abū ʿAlī al-Ṣawwāf, as stated in Tārīkh Baghdād (12/151) (1).

The chain is therefore authentic, since all of its narrators are trustworthy—as is explicitly stated in the scholars’ books—except al-Washshāʾ. Yet you have already learned of his uprightness and of the hadith masters’ narrations from him. Moreover, he is corroborated; thus, only one ignorant of this discipline would raise an objection concerning him.

The third point—and it is the strangest and furthest removed from knowledge—is that he gave preference to the narration of Saʿīd ibn Manṣūr, despite his uncertainty and hesitation between “the three mosques” and “a congregational mosque,” on the grounds that Saʿīd was stronger than the three who stated decisively, without any uncertainty, “the three mosques”—namely, al-Marwazī, Ibn al-Faraj, and Hishām ibn ʿAmmār (2). Our aforementioned brother failed to notice that uncertainty is not knowledge, and that one should accept from the words of the uncertain narrator whatever agrees with the trustworthy narrators, rather than reject the categorical assertion of trustworthy narrators because of the uncertainty of one who is more reliable. Thus it should be said: Saʿīd agrees with the trustworthy narrators on one side of his uncertainty—“the three mosques”—so his agreement should be accepted, while his uncertainty, namely his statement, “or a congregational mosque,” should be disregarded,