And he concluded his biographical notice by saying: “As for al-Husayn al-Qabbani, he accused him of lying, but he went too far.” Moreover, I have not found a biographical notice for Muhammad ibn Salih ibn Haniʾ (1).

However, I found another route for the hadith whose chain is unobjectionable. Al-Bazzar said in his Musnad, al-Bahr al-Zakhkhar, no. 267; and in Kashf al-Astar (1/104/185): Umar ibn al-Khattab al-Sijistani narrated to us; Ibrahim ibn al-Mundhir narrated to us; Muhammad ibn Sadaqah al-Fadaki narrated to us; Malik narrated to us, from Zayd ibn Aslam, from his father, from Umar, who said: “A letter was sent to the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, and he said to Abdullah ibn al-Arqam: ‘Reply to these people.’ Abdullah ibn al-Arqam took it and wrote the reply. He then brought the letter and presented it to the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, who said: ‘You have done well.’ This remained in my mind until I assumed office, so I put him in charge of the public treasury.”

Al-Bazzar said: “We know of no one who narrated it in this manner except Malik.”

I say: However, al-Daraqutni declared it defective in his book al-ʿIlal (2/143–144), saying: “It is a hadith uniquely narrated by Muhammad ibn Sadaqah al-Fadaki—who is not well-known, though there is no harm in him—from Malik, from Zayd ibn Aslam, from his father, from Umar. Others narrate it from Malik as a mursal report, and that is correct.”

I say: This al-Fadaki was mentioned by Ibn Hibban in al-Thiqat (9/67), who said: “His hadith may be considered when he explicitly states direct hearing, for he practised tadlis.”

I say: Here he explicitly states direct transmission, and the chain to him is authentic. Thus, the chain is sound, provided that