Indeed, some Islamic parties have gone so far as to declare the very handshake in question permissible, making it obligatory for every party member to adopt that view. They buttress their stance with arguments that carry no weight, all the while turning a blind eye to this ḥadīth and to other plainly worded reports that establish the non-legitimacy of hand-shaking with women—reports that, God willing, will be cited below under numbers 526 and 527.

227 – “What keeps you from listening to the counsel I give you? It is that you say, when you enter the morning and when you enter the evening: ‘Yā Ḥayy, yā Qayyūm (O Ever-Living, O Self-Sustaining), by Your mercy I seek relief; set all of my affairs aright, and do not leave me to my own self for the blink of an eye—ever.’”

Ibn al-Sunnī recorded this supplication in ʽAmal al-Yawm wa-al-Laylah (no. 46), and al-Bayhaqī in al-Asmāʾ (p. 112), through the route of Zayd ibn al-Ḥabbāb: “ʽUthmān ibn Muhib”—the original manuscript has “Wahb,” which is a copyist’s error—“the client of Banū Hāshim, narrated to us. He said: I heard Anas ibn Mālik (may Allah be pleased with him) say: The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said to Fāṭimah (may Allah be pleased with her):” and he mentioned the ḥadīth.

I comment: This chain of transmission is ḥasan. All of its narrators are trustworthy save for ʽUthmān ibn Muhib—who is not the same man as ʽUthmān ibn ʽAbd Allāh ibn Muhib. Ibn Abī Ḥātim (3/169) quotes his father as saying, “His ḥadīth is ṣāliḥ,” and al-Ḥāfiẓ states in al-Taqrīb that he is “acceptable” (maqbūl).

Al-Nasaʾī likewise transmitted the ḥadīth in his al-Kubrā, and al-Bazār cited it—as related in al-Targhīb (1/232)—with the judgment, “a sound chain.” It was also recorded by al-Ḥākim, who declared it authentic according to the criteria of the Two Shaykhs, and al-Dhahabī concurred with him, although both of them slipped on one point, the clarification of which I have provided in al-Taʿlīq al-Raghīb.