ʿAbd Allāh ibn Maslama narrated to us; Mālik transmitted it from Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd, from Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm, from Abū Salama ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, from Abū Saʿīd—may Allah be pleased with him—who said: I heard the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, say:

“A people will emerge among you who will regard your prayer as insignificant compared with theirs and your deeds as paltry beside their own. They will recite the Qur’an, yet it will not pass beyond their throats; they will shoot out of the religion as an arrow shoots through its prey.”

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Yūsuf also narrated to us; Mālik conveyed this same report with the identical wording.