entered the evening.”

I have reservations about the soundness of this addition, because Wakiʿ contradicts Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd al-Qaṭṭān, the great hadith master. Wakiʿ too was a hadith master, his equal or nearly so, and Imam Aḥmad praised him highly, as may be seen in his biography in al-Tahdhīb. Yet, in Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd’s biography, he said: “He is more accurate than these”—meaning Ibn Mahdī, Wakiʿ, and others. Moreover, the addition in question does not occur in the forthcoming narration of Shuʿbah, nor in the narrations of other trustworthy transmitters from Sufyān recorded by al-Nasāʾī (290/343 and 344) and al-Bayhaqī in al-Daʿawāt al-Kabīr (19/26).

Muḥammad ibn Bashshār, along with Wakiʿ, contradicted those numerous routes from Yaḥyā, saying: Yaḥyā narrated to us from Sufyān, from Salamah ibn Kuhayl, from Dharr, from an unnamed son of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abzā, from his father, that the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said: “We have entered the morning ...” the hadith. Thus, he left the Successor unidentified, without naming him, and inserted Dharr between him and Salamah. Al-Nasāʾī recorded it (134/2). I have no doubt that this narration is anomalous, because it contradicts the majority.

Shuʿbah likewise narrated it from Salamah with the additional link and without identifying the narrator. Al-Nasāʾī recorded it under numbers (3 and 345), as did Aḥmad (3/406 and 407); however, he named the unidentified narrator as Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān. Al-Bayhaqī also recorded it (no. 27). I say: Shuʿbah’s contradiction of Sufyān—namely, al-Thawrī—is considered anomalous, for Sufyān had a stronger memory than him, as Shuʿbah himself acknowledged, as will follow. Yet it may be said that Salamah was trustworthy and precise, and that he narrated the hadith in both ways: at one time from ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, which Sufyān retained; and at another time from Dharr, from Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, which Shuʿbah retained.