Nevertheless, Ibn Abi Hatim did provide a biographical entry for him, saying (4/2/190):

“Yahya ibn Malik, Abu Ayyub al-Azdi al-Ataki, al-Basri, al-Maraghi—an Arab tribal affiliation. He narrated from Abdullah ibn Amr, Abu Hurayrah, Ibn Abbas, Samurah ibn Jundub, and Juwayriyyah. He died during the governorship of al-Hajjaj. Qatadah, Abu Imran al-Jawni, and Abu al-Wasil Abd al-Hamid ibn Wasil narrated from him.”

He did not mention any narrator criticism or accreditation concerning him.

Ibn Hibban included him in al-Thiqat (1/256) and said:

“He was from the people of Basra. He narrated from Abdullah ibn Umar, and Qatadah narrated from him. Abu Ayyub died during the governorship of al-Hajjaj.”

I say: A narrator such as him has good hadith, Allah willing, due to his being a Successor and because a number of trustworthy narrators reported from him, in addition to al-Hakim’s and al-Dhahabi’s authentication of his hadith. And Allah knows best.

Al-Hakam ibn Abd al-Malik differed from him, saying: from Qatadah, from al-Hasan, from Samurah, with the same report.

Ahmad reported it (5/10), as did al-Tabarani in al-Mu'jam al-Saghir (p. 70), where he said: “No one narrated it from Qatadah except al-Hakam.”

I say: He is weak, as al-Haythami stated (2/177). In al-Targhib (1/255), al-Mundhiri indicated that the hadith was weak, citing al-Tabarani and al-Asbahani as its sources. Both he and al-Haythami overlooked the fact that it is found in the Musnad—and indeed in the Sunan and the Mustadrak—thus confirming the well-known saying: “How much the earlier ones have left for the later ones!”

Note: Al-Hakam’s wording is:

“... For a man may be among the people of Paradise, yet delay attending the Friday prayer, and thus be delayed from Paradise, although he is indeed among its people.”