“It is a good, authentic, singular hadith. We know it only through the hadith of Abdullah ibn al-Muthanna.”

I say: There is disagreement concerning him. Al-Hafiz mentioned the scholars’ views concerning him, ranging from declaring him trustworthy, to deeming him weak, to taking an intermediate position; then he gave preference to considering him trustworthy. See it, if you wish, in 1/189.

I say: In my judgment, the man has a degree of weakness, and this hadith of his indicates it, for he transmitted it with a remarkable inconsistency. Nevertheless, it is not the sort of inconsistency that renders a hadith defective, since there is no contradiction between his narrations. Rather, it more closely resembles variation in form. The version I have documented is one type.

A second type is an abridgement of it, with the wording:

Whenever he offered a greeting, he would offer it three times; and whenever he spoke a word, he repeated it three times.

Al-Bukhari, al-Tirmidhi, and others narrated it in one version.

A third type is still more concise, with the wording:

He would repeat a word so that it might be understood from him.

This is the version in al-Shama'il, and one of its versions in al-Sunan.

In my commentary on Mukhtasar al-Shama'il, I mentioned that al-Hakim considered it an omission from the Two Sahihs; and al-Dhahabi objected to him, saying:

“Al-Bukhari narrated it, except for the words: ‘so that it might be understood from him.’”

I responded there that this objection has no basis, since al-Bukhari narrated it—as in the hadith under discussion—with the wording: “so that it would be understood from him”; and the meaning is the same.