al-Anṣārī, whom Ibn Ḥibbān mentioned in al-Thiqāt (4/261).
As for his categorical assertion that he is trustworthy, there is no basis for it, for he is not a well-known narrator, and no one other than Ibn Ḥibbān declared him trustworthy. And Allah knows best.
From what has preceded, you will know that the statement of the shaykh annotating al-Aḥādīth al-Mukhtārah—“Its chain of transmission is good!”—is itself not good, because of the unknown status we have explained. Allah is the One from whom success comes. *
- “O Allah, strengthen Islam through ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb in particular.”
Ibn Ḥibbān recorded it in his Ṣaḥīḥ (2180, Mawārid), through the route of ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿĪsā al-Farawī. Likewise, al-Bayhaqī recorded it in his Sunan (6/370), and Ibn ʿAdī in al-Kāmil (6/310), from whom Ibn ʿAsākir transmitted it in Tārīkh Dimashq (12/718)—where they gave him the kunyah Abū ʿAlqamah. He said: ʿAbd al-Malik ibn al-Mājishūn narrated to us: Muslim ibn Khālid narrated to me, from Hishām ibn ʿUrwah, from his father, from ʿĀʾishah, that the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said: … and he mentioned it.
I say: This is a weak chain of transmission, because of the weakness of this al-Farawī. It is surprising that Ibn Ḥibbān deemed it authentic, although he mentioned him in al-Ḍuʿafāʾ, under both his name and kunyah (2/45), and said: “He narrates strange reports and attributes to trustworthy narrators reports which anyone versed in hadith recognizes to be inverted.”
Others likewise declared him weak. Al-Ḥusaynī, in al-Ikmāl (7/84), named him “ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad al-Farawī”!
Those above him in the chain are trustworthy, were it not that Muslim ibn Khālid—the Meccan al-Zanjī—had poor retention,