A man came to the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and said, “I love you.” He replied with the foregoing.

I say: This is a good chain of transmission. Its narrators are known and trustworthy, apart from Bakr ibn Sulaym. Ibn Hibban mentioned him in al-Thiqat (8/149), and five trustworthy narrators reported from him; thus, he is truthful, as stated in al-Kashif. Al-Haythami likewise declared him trustworthy, saying after the hadith (10/274): “Al-Bazzar narrated it, and its narrators are those of the Sahih collections, apart from Bakr ibn Sulaym, who is trustworthy.”

I say: Abu Tuwalah’s name was ‘Abd Allah ibn ‘Abd al-Rahman ibn Ma‘mar ibn Hazm al-Ansari. It is corroborated by a hadith from Abu Dharr, may Allah be pleased with him: he came to the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and said, “I love you, O members of the Household.” The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, asked him, “For Allah?” He replied, “For Allah.” He said: “Then prepare armor for poverty, for poverty reaches those who love us more swiftly than a torrent descends from the top of a hill to its bottom.”

Al-Hakim recorded it (4/331) and said: “Authentic according to the criteria of al-Bukhari and Muslim.” Al-Dhahabi agreed with him.

I say: Rather, it is merely authentic, for it comes through Muhammad ibn Ghalib: ‘Affan narrated to us, and so on. Ghalib is not among the narrators of al-Bukhari and Muslim; only ‘Affan is, though he was not one of their direct shaykhs, as they narrate from him through an intermediary. The hadith is also corroborated by a hadith from ‘Abd Allah ibn Mughffal, which I had previously documented in al-Da‘ifah (1681), before discovering these two hadiths. The credit for this goes to one of the students of