it follows that al-Hasan heard the report from Abu al-Zubayr once without any intermediary and on another occasion through the interposition of al-Juʿfi and Layth.” As for the version he ascribed to Abu Nuʿaym, it is most likely Abu Nuʿaym’s own transmission; in any case, al-Daraqutni also related it through him, from al-Hasan on the authority of Jabir. Ahmad likewise recorded the hadith in his Musnad (3/339)—exactly as it appears in Ibn Abi Shaybah (1/97/1)—saying: “Aswad b. Amir narrated to us; al-Hasan b. Salih narrated from Abu al-Zubayr, from Jabir,” as a marfuʿ report. The annotator of Nasb al-Rayah, citing al-Sharh al-Kabir ʿala al-Muqniʿ (2/11), comments: “This isnad is sahih (authentic) and connected; all of its narrators are reliable. Aswad b. Amir is cited by al-Bukhari, and al-Hasan b. Salih met Abu al-Zubayr, having been born more than twenty years before the latter’s death.” I respond that the claim of “connectedness” is debatable, for Abu al-Zubayr was notorious for tadlis (concealing the immediate source). Here he relates with an ʿan-formula and does not state that he heard the hadith, so the chain is presumed to be broken. I later discovered another route for the report through Abu al-Zubayr. Imam Muhammad included it in his Muwatta (p. 96), as did al-Daraqutni (no. 154) and al-Tabarani in al-Awsat, by way of Sahl b. al-Abbas al-Tirmidhi: “Sahl b. al-Abbas narrated to us; Ismail b. Ulayya from Ayyub from Abu al-Zubayr …” Al-Daraqutni remarked: “This hadith is munkar (denounced), and Sahl b. al-Abbas is matruk (abandoned).” The various lines of transmission are reviewed in the book Imam al-Kalam (pp. 133–138), where the author concludes: “In sum, some of the routes are sahih or hasan (sound), while others are weak, yet their weakness is offset by the many corroborating chains. Therefore, to claim that the hadith is unfounded, unusable as evidence, or the like…”