“No one narrated it from ‘Awf except Abu Shihab, and Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahib was alone in narrating it.”
I say: This is a strong supporting transmission for Ibrahim ibn Hani’ through Musa ibn Harun, who was a trustworthy hadith master. Thus, al-Tabarani’s chain of transmission is also authentic. It is therefore astonishing that al-Haythami singled out al-Bazzar’s chain as trustworthy, when al-Tabarani’s chain is more deserving of that assessment—for Musa ibn Harun was more trustworthy, more retentive, and better known than Ibrahim ibn Hani’, to such an extent that al-Haythami did not know the latter, as has been indicated above.
Furthermore, the hadith has many supporting reports. Among them is the report of Abu Hurayrah, with wording like that of the hadith under discussion. Al-Bazzar recorded it (no. 687) through two chains from Muhammad ibn Aban, from Zayd ibn Aslam, from ‘Ata’ ibn Yasar, from him. He said:
“Muhammad ibn Aban was alone in narrating it.”
I say: He was Muhammad ibn Salih al-Qurashi al-Ju‘fi al-Kufi, whom Ibn Ma‘in and others declared weak.
Another is the report of ‘Abd Allah ibn Mas‘ud with the same wording. Al-Bazzar also recorded it (685), as did others, and its documentation has already been given under hadith 2837.
Another is the report of Mu‘adh ibn Jabal, with wording close to that of the report of Musa ibn Harun. Its documentation has already been given in volume one, no. 164, and it is also documented in al-Irwa’ (578).
Know that the combining mentioned in this hadith and similar reports is actual combining: delaying the first prayer until the time of the other prayer—for example, the noon and afternoon prayers are performed together during the time of the afternoon prayer. The same applies to the sunset prayer with the night prayer. There are explicit authentic hadiths concerning this. Even more explicit are the hadiths concerning combining by bringing prayers forward, which means bringing the afternoon prayer forward to the time of the noon prayer and performing them together then; and likewise in the case of the sunset prayer with