Ahmad 7235

Its chain of transmission is sahih. Muhammad bin Abdullah is Muhammad bin Abdullah bin Abdul-Rahman bin Abu Sasaa the Ansari, the Najjari, of Madinah. His father was named after his grandfather. This Muhammad is trustworthy. It will come in the Musnad at 11836 that Ibn Ishaq deemed him trustworthy, and Ibn Saad and others also deemed him trustworthy. Bukhari included his biography in al-Kabir, 1/140-141, and Ibn Abu Hatim in al-Jarh wal-Tadeel, 3/299. Malik said, "The family of Abu Sasaa had a circle in the masjid, and they were people of knowledge and understanding, and all of them used to give legal rulings."The hadith appears in Muwatta, page 941. Bukhari related it, 10:93-94, from Abdullah bin Yusuf, from Malik. See also 1487, 1492, 1531, 1575, and also 1690, 1701, and also 7192.Regarding the phrase "afflicts him with something," Ibn Athir said it means He tries him with calamities in order to reward him for them. One says musibah, mathubah, and musabah, with the plural forms masaib and masawib. It refers to something disliked that befalls a person.Ibn Hajar said in al-Fath, "This is how most [meaning most transmitters of Sahih Bukhari] have it, with the sad vowelled with a kasrah, the doer being Allah. Abu Ubayd al-Harawi said its meaning is He tries him with calamities in order to reward him for them. Others said its meaning is He directs affliction toward him, so it befalls him. Ibn Jawzi said most scholars of hadith transmit it with the sad vowelled with a kasrah, but I heard Ibn Khashab give it with a fathah, and that is better and more fitting." This is what Ibn Jawzi said, though if the matter were reversed it would have been more fitting, and Allah knows best.Al-Tibi explained the reading with a fathah by saying it is more fitting with proper etiquette, citing the words of Allah Almighty, "and when I fall ill, it is He who cures me" [Shuara 26:80].I say, meaning Ibn Hajar, what supports the reading with a kasrah is what Ahmad related from the hadith of Mahmud bin Labeed, as a raised report, "When Allah loves a people, He tries them. Whoever bears it patiently has patience credited to him, and whoever shows distress has distress recorded against him." Its narrators are trustworthy, except that there is disagreement over whether Mahmud bin Labeed actually heard from the Prophet ﷺ, though he did see him while still young. It has a corroborating report from the hadith of Anas, found in Tirmidhi, who graded it hasan.In these hadiths there is tremendous good news for every believer, for the human being is generally never free from some pain caused by illness, worry, or similar things that have been mentioned, and that illnesses, pains, and sufferings, whether of the body or of the heart, atone for the sins of the one who experiences them.The hadith of Mahmud bin Labeed to which the Hafiz referred will come in the Musnad, 5:427, hadith.