Al-Bayhaqī then said:

“Al-Yasaʿ ibn Ṭalḥah was declared weak, and the hadith has an interrupted chain: Mujāhid did not meet Abū Dharr. And Allah knows best.”

I say: The assertion that he did not meet him had already been made by more than one of the hadith masters. In al-Zaylaʿī’s Naṣb al-Rāyah (1/254), following the aforementioned assertion, it states:

“The shaykh—that is, Ibn Daqīq al-ʿĪd—said in al-Imām: ‘This hadith of Abū Dharr is flawed in four respects:

First: there is a break between Mujāhid and Abū Dharr ...’” Then he mentioned al-Bayhaqī’s statement.

“Second: there is variation in its chain of transmission. Saʿīd ibn Sālim narrated it from Ibn al-Muʾammal, from Ḥumayd, the freedman of ʿAfrāʾ, from Mujāhid, from Abū Dharr, omitting Qays ibn Saʿd. Ibn ʿAdī transmitted it likewise in al-Kāmil. Al-Bayhaqī said:

‘ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad al-Shāmī likewise narrated it from Ibn al-Muʾammal, from Ḥumayd al-Aʿraj, from Mujāhid.’

Third: Ibn al-Muʾammal is weak. Al-Nasāʾī and Ibn Maʿīn said: ‘Weak.’ Aḥmad said: ‘His hadith contain objectionable reports.’ Ibn ʿAdī said: ‘Weakness is evident in most of his hadith.’

Fourth: Ḥumayd, the freedman of ʿAfrāʾ, is weak. Al-Bayhaqī said: ‘He is not strong.’ Abū ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-Barr said: ‘He is weak.’” End quote.

I say: In my view, these defects are exceedingly feeble, except for the first and third, which require examination, as will be explained. The feeblest of them is the fourth, for this Ḥumayd—who was Ibn Qays al-Aʿraj, the Meccan Quran-reciter—