Al-Dhahabī transmitted this from him in al-Mīzān, and al-ʿAsqalānī in Lisān al-Mīzān; both endorsed it and mentioned that he was the transmitter of the Book of Jihad from Ibn al-Mubārak. I do not know how this escaped al-Ḥāfiẓ, who nevertheless relied on the aforementioned book in what preceded!
- “He would rise and pray during the night [on his small prayer mat].” Maymūnah, may Allah be pleased with her, said: “While I was sleeping beside him, [lying stretched out in line with the Messenger of Allah’s place of prostration], whenever he prostrated, the edge of his garment would touch me, while I was menstruating.”
Aḥmad narrated it (6/330–331) through several routes from ʿAbd al-Wāḥid and others, from Sulaymān al-Shaybānī, who said: “ʿAbd Allāh ibn Shaddād narrated to us: I heard Maymūnah, the wife of the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, say …” Then he related it.
The wording is that of ʿAbd al-Wāḥid—namely, Ibn Ziyād al-ʿAbdī—who was trustworthy and one of the narrators of the two Ṣaḥīḥs. The additions are from others, and all of them are authentic.
The hadith is recorded in the two Ṣaḥīḥs, the Sunan collections, and elsewhere, in wordings similar to this one. It has been sourced in Ṣaḥīḥ Abī Dāwūd (395/663). However, Muslim recorded it in a highly abridged wording:
“He would pray while I was opposite him, and sometimes his garment would touch me when he prostrated. He would pray on the small prayer mat.”
This caused some of our brothers difficulty. In a letter sent to me from Riyadh, dated 2/6/1416 AH, one of them asked:
“Is it to be understood from this that a woman may stand in the same row as a male imam in a congregational voluntary prayer, as the heading of this hadith and the one preceding it in Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim perhaps indicate? Or is it to be understood that she was sitting and not praying …?”