Then, after that, I visited Muʿāwiyah and heard him instructing the people to do the very same.
In another wording: “He used to forbid idle ‘he said, she said,’ the squandering of wealth, and excessive questioning.”
He also forbade disobedience to mothers, burying daughters alive, and the attitude of “withhold and demand.”
Glossary of ḥadīth terms
• dubur kulla ṣalāh (the end of every prayer): with ḍammah or fatḥah on the dāl and sukūn on the bāʾ; it refers to the conclusion of the prayer, that is, after the salām.
• maktūbah (prescribed): meaning obligatory—the five daily prayers. The word maktūbah restricts reports that are otherwise general.
• “and the fortune of the fortunate avails him nothing against You”: al-jadd, with a fatḥah on the jīm, means good fortune and wealth; in other words, a person’s riches and luck cannot benefit him against Allah.
• burying daughters alive: placing them in the earth while they are still living. Some pre-Islamic Arabs did this out of fear of disgrace or poverty.
• manʿ wa hāt (withhold and demand): miserliness that refuses to spend in lawful causes while avidly hoarding wealth.
• disobedience to mothers: al-ʿuqūq, as stated in al-Muḥkam, is to break obedience to one’s parents; it can extend to all relatives. Here it refers to any word or deed that harms a parent.
• qīl wa qāl (he said, she said): the common reading places a fatḥah on the lām of qīl, being quoted verbatim.
• māniʿ and muʿṭī (withholder and giver): transmitted with fatḥah in both words, although grammatically they would normally appear in the accusative; they are treated as if independent nouns.
Overall meaning
Muʿāwiyah ibn Abī Sufyān wrote to al-Mughīrah ibn Shuʿbah—who was his governor in Kūfah—saying, “Write down for me a ḥadīth you heard from the Messenger of Allah ﷺ.” Al-Mughīrah, may Allah be pleased with them both, sent him this ḥadīth, which combines several aspects of monotheism, praises Allah, and affirms that all control and dominion lie in His hand. It also contains noble prophetic directives.
Al-Mughīrah related that when the Prophet ﷺ finished an obligatory prayer he would declare Allah’s oneness, negating every deity besides Him and affirming worship for Him alone, for He has no partner in His sovereignty, worship, names, or attributes, and all governance is His. No one can withhold what He gives, no one can give what He withholds, and a person of fortune and wealth gains nothing from his fortune and wealth against Him.
Al-Mughīrah then informed Muʿāwiyah, may Allah be pleased with them both, that the Prophet ﷺ also prohibited these blameworthy traits.