your very eyes: he cited Abu Ḥātim’s and Ibn Naṣr’s criticism of the hadith of Ibn ʿUmar, without realizing that it is limited to some of its routes of transmission, and that the aforementioned weakness—even if conceded—does not entail the weakness of the hadith in view of its other chains of transmission and corroborating reports, among them the hadith of Abu Hurayrah in Sahih Muslim. So take heed, O people of insight! *
- “You are not like me; the delight of my eyes has been placed in prayer.”
Ibn Naṣr narrated it in Taʿẓīm Qadr al-Ṣalāh (folio 68/2): Yaḥyā ibn ʿUthmān narrated to us: Hayqal narrated to us from al-Awzāʿī, from Isḥāq ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Ṭalḥah, from Anas:
The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) rose during the night, and a woman was praying behind him. When he became aware of her, he turned to her and said, “Lie down, if you wish.”
She said, “I feel energetic!” He said: ... and then he mentioned it.
I say: This chain of transmission is authentic. All its narrators are trustworthy and are narrators of Muslim, except Yaḥyā ibn ʿUthmān—Abū Zakariyyā al-Ḥarbī of Baghdad. Abū Zurʿah said, “Trustworthy.” Ibn Maʿīn said, “There is no harm in him,” as stated in al-Mīzān, al-Taʿjīl, and Tārīkh al-Islām (17/403). Both al-Mīzān and al-Taʿjīl omitted the statement of Ṣāliḥ ibn Muḥammad Jazrah: “Truthful, and among the devout worshippers.” Al-Khaṭīb transmitted it from him (14/191). Ibn Ḥibbān included him in al-Thiqāt and said (9/263), “He would sometimes err.”