Whichever of the two it was, al-Hasan was the Basran mentioned in the hadith of ʿAʾidh. As noted above, he narrated mursal reports and practised tadlīs; although scholars have explicitly affirmed that he heard from Anas ibn Malik, this would apply only if he had explicitly stated transmission here and the chain to him were sound. Yet the hadith appears to have been known among the early generations, for al-Bazzar—as you saw above—categorically stated that Abu Barzah had also narrated it.

This is further supported by the fact that Imam al-Awzaʿi categorically attributed it to the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, in the lengthy account of his congratulating Abu Jaʿfar al-ʿAbbasi upon his accession to the caliphate and admonishing him. Muhammad ibn Musʿab al-Qarqasani narrated this account from him, and Abu Nuʿaym recorded it in al-Hilyah (6/136–140).

In sum, these corroborating reports reassure one of the hadith’s sound establishment, especially since three imams—Muslim, Abu ʿAwanah, and Ibn Hibban—declared it authentic.

Know that al-Nawawi cited this hadith in two places in Riyad al-Salihin. In the first (no. 197), he cited it in full and attributed it to Muslim; in the other (no. 661), he cited it without Ibn Ziyad’s words, “Sit ...,” and said: “Reported by al-Bukhari and Muslim.” This is an error, though we do not know whether it came from a copyist or from the author himself.

The proprietor of al-Maktab al-Islami drew attention to this in his new 1412 edition of al-Riyad, which he embellished by prefacing it with two photographed pages from two manuscripts of the book, claiming that he had consulted them—that is, for the purpose of critical editing. Yet there is no trace of this in his edition. Otherwise, this would have been the appropriate place for him to substantiate his aforementioned claim to the readers by explaining what the two manuscripts say regarding this error.

That is a habit we know well from Akhzam: he frequently embellishes his publications with photographed pages from manuscripts that he claims are in his library—or perhaps merely photographic copies—thereby giving readers the impression that he consulted them in preparing the edition, when this is not the case. The clearest example of this is his recent printing of the four Sunan collections, whose authentic hadiths I had distinguished from their weak ones and presented to him; he then issued them in plainly commercial editions and divided each book