concealment in transmission, as I have demonstrated at length in my detailed sourcing of certain hadiths. Abdullah ibn Buraydah was never accused of any concealment in transmission, and his having heard directly from his father has been soundly established, as I demonstrated in the preceding hadith (2904) and elsewhere. His father died in 63 AH. Indeed, it is established in Musnad Ahmad (5/347) that he entered upon Muawiyah with his father; Muawiyah died in 60 AH, while Aisha died in 57 AH. Thus, he certainly lived during her lifetime. Accordingly, the two Shaykhs included his narrations from certain Companions who died in the same year as she did, or near it, such as Abdullah ibn Mughaffal; and similarly Samurah ibn Jundub, who died in 58 AH. Indeed, they also listed him among those who narrated from Abdullah ibn Masud, who died in 32 AH, without judging his narration defective on grounds of a break in the chain.

Perhaps for the reason I have mentioned, al-Hafiz al-Mizzi did not bother to mention the aforementioned assertion, thereby indicating its weakness. Likewise did al-Hafiz al-Dhahabi in his History; and al-Hafiz al-Ala'i followed their approach in Jami al-Tahsil (252/338), mentioning him in connection with disconnected transmission only in his narration from Umar. This is very clear, for he was born three years after the beginning of Umar's caliphate.

The foregoing verification and refutation of any break in the chain would stand even if there were nothing by which the hadith could be corroborated. How much more so when there are two further considerations:

The first is that some narrators identified Ibn Buraydah as Sulayman, as occurs in al-Nasa'i (500/877) and al-Mustadrak (1/530), through the route of Alqamah ibn Marthad from him. Al-Hakim said: “Authentic according to the criteria of the two Shaykhs.” Al-Dhahabi agreed with him, and al-Mundhiri endorsed it.

However, al-Hafiz critiqued this in Takhrij al-Adhkar—as Ibn Allan relates in al-Futuhat (4/346)—saying:

“There is room for scrutiny in this, for al-Bayhaqi stated definitively in the Book of Divorce in al-Sunan that Abdullah ibn Buraydah did not hear from Aisha!”