and walking to congregational prayers, and waiting for one prayer after another.” He said: “What, then, are the degrees?” I said: “Feeding people, spreading greetings of peace, and praying at night while people are asleep.” He said: “Say.” I asked: “What should I say?” He said: “Say: ‘O Allah, I ask You to enable me to do good deeds and refrain from evil deeds. And if You will a trial for a people while I am among them, then take me to Yourself without my having been afflicted by it.’”

Al-Tabarani recorded it in al-Duʿa (3/1462/1416): Al-Hasan ibn ʿAli al-Maʿmari narrated to us; Sulayman ibn Muhammad al-Mubaraki narrated to us; Hammad ibn Dulayl narrated to us from Sufyan ibn Saʿid al-Thawri, from Qays ibn Muslim, from Tariq ibn Shihab—or ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Sabit. Hammad ibn Dulayl said: Al-Hasan ibn Salih ibn Hayy also narrated to me, from ʿAmr ibn Murrah, from ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Sabit, from Abu Thaʿlabah al-Khushani, from Abu ʿUbaydah ibn al-Jarrah—may Allah be pleased with him—from the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, who said: … and he mentioned it.

Al-Khatib also recorded it in al-Tarikh (8/151) through al-Tabarani’s route, but added at its beginning: “On the night when I was taken on the Night Journey, I saw my Lord …” to the end of the hadith.

This addition is anomalous, first because it contradicts al-Tabarani’s book, and also because al-Khatib followed it with another route from Muhammad ibn ʿAli ibn al-Madini, who said: Abu Dawud al-Mubaraki narrated it to us through this chain.

I have not identified this Ibn al-Madini, but al-Hasan ibn ʿAli al-Maʿmari corroborated him, as mentioned above. He was one of al-Tabarani’s trustworthy shaykhs, and those above him are trustworthy narrators whose reports are found in Muslim, apart from Hammad ibn Dulayl, who is truthful, as stated in al-Taqrib. Al-Dhahabi said in al-Kashif: “Trustworthy; he resided in Mecca.” Thus, the chain of transmission is authentic.