- As for the hadith of al-Sāʾib, it is narrated from him by his son Khallād ibn al-Sāʾib al-Juhanī. Ibn Ḥibbān listed him in al-Thiqāt (4/201), and a number of reliable narrators reported from him. Al-Ḥāfiẓ said: “Truthful.” It has three routes from him:
The first is narrated by Ḥammād ibn al-Jaʿd, from Qatādah, who said: Khallād al-Juhanī narrated to me from his father, al-Sāʾib, attributing it to the Prophet, with the second wording.
It was recorded by al-Bukhārī in al-Tārīkh (2/2/151) and by al-Ṭabarānī in al-Muʿjam al-Kabīr (7/167/6623).
I say: Its narrators are reliable, apart from Ḥammād ibn al-Jaʿd, who is weak, as stated in al-Taqrīb. Al-Haythamī likewise deemed it defective on his account, though he said:
“Al-Ṭabarānī narrated it in al-Kabīr and al-Awsaṭ, and it contains Ḥammād ibn al-Jaʿd, whose weakness they have unanimously agreed upon!”
That is what he said. Yet there is no consensus concerning him. How could there be, when Abū Ḥātim al-Rāzī—despite his strictness in narrator criticism—said of him:
“There is nothing objectionable in his hadith.”
I say: He may therefore be cited in corroboration, and Allah knows best.
Moreover, his attribution of it to al-Awsaṭ through this route appears to be an error, in our view. For he mentioned it in his other work, Majmaʿ al-Baḥrayn (1/296–297, al-Rushd edition), only through the third route, which follows.
The second route is from Muḥammad ibn Yazīd ibn Sinān al-Ruhāwī: my father narrated to us from Yaḥyā ibn Abī Kathīr, who said: Khallād informed me of it more fully, with the wording: