Ahmad 7408

The isnad is sahih. Sufyan is Thawri. Salm - with a fatha on the plain sin and a sakin on the lam - bin Abdul-Rahman, Nakhai, Kufi, brother of Husayn, is trustworthy. Ahmad bin Hanbal affirmed his reliability, his being deemed trustworthy was also reported from Ibn Main, and others besides them affirmed his reliability as well. Bukhari gave him a biography in the Kabir 2/2/157 and mentioned no criticism of him there. Ibn Abu Hatim also gave him a biography in Jarh wal-Tadil 2/1/265-266, and his being deemed trustworthy was reported from Ibn Main and others.But Ibn Abu Hatim made an error here, and this is strange. Perhaps he followed Ali bin Madini in this, if it was not simply a lapse of attention on his own part. He narrated, with a chain, from Ibn Awn, who said, Ibrahim [meaning Nakhai] said to us, "Beware of Abu Abdul-Rahim and Mughira bin Saeed, for they are both liars!" Then he narrated from Musaddad, who said, Ali - meaning Ibn Madini - claimed that Abu Abdul-Rahman is Sulaym bin Abdul-Rahman Nakhai!!Now firstly, Bukhari was the person most knowledgeable about his teacher Ibn Madini, and the most likely of all to follow his statements both in narration and in the criticism and validation of narrators. Yet he did not mention this, nor allude to it, in the biography of Sulaym, and he would not have left it out had he known of it.Secondly, al-Hafiz - may Allah reward him well - took up this statement in Tahdhib and clarified the error contained in it, saying, "I have continued to find this statement of Ali's hard to accept, because Salim is too significant a figure for Ibrahim to have said this about him and paired him with Mughira bin Saeed, until I found that Abu Bishr Dulabi stated definitively in Kuna that what Ibrahim Nakhai meant by Abu Abdul-Rahim was Shaqiq Dabbi, who was one of the leading Kharijites and used to tell stories to people. Abu Abdul-Rahman Sulami and other senior scholars also criticized him." This is a valuable clarification on his part.What he referred to from Dulabi's statement is found in Kitab Kuna 2:70, where he says, "Abu Abdul-Rahim is Shaqiq Dabbi." Hammad bin Zayd said, from Ibn Awn, "Ibrahim said to us, 'Beware of Mughira bin Saeed and Abu Abdul-Rahim, for they are both liars,' meaning Mughira bin Saeed and Shaqiq Dabbi." Nevertheless, Shaqiq Dabbi, the Kufi storyteller, was given a biography by Bukhari in the Kabir 2/2/248, and he mentioned no criticism of him there. See also his biography in Lisan Mizan 3:151.Bukhari narrated this hadith in the Kabir, in the biography of Sulaym bin Abdul-Rahman, from Abu Naeem, from Sufyan - that is, Thawri - with this isnad. He then narrated it also via the route of Shuba, from Abdullah bin Yazid Nakhai, from Abu Zura, from Abu Hurairah. Muslim narrated it, 2:95, via the route of Waki, and via the route of Ibn Numayr and Abdul-Razzaq, all three of them from Thawri, then he also narrated it via the route of Shuba. Abu Dawud narrated it, 2547 [2:328 in Awn al-Mabud], from Muhammad bin Kathir, from Sufyan, with the same wording. Munziri, 2437, attributed it to Tirmidhi and Nasai as well.Shikal, with a kasra on the dotted shin and a light, unshaddaded kaf. Muslim said in his narration, "And he added, in the hadith of Abdul-Razzaq, 'and the shikal,'" meaning that the horse has white on its right hind leg and its left foreleg, or on its right foreleg and its left hind leg. This explanation is also established in the narration of Abu Dawud, so it is not, as might be assumed at first glance from Muslim's narration, part of Abdul-Razzaq's own wording.Khattabi said in Maalim Sunan, "This is how it came in the explanation, from this route. The shikal may also be explained as the horse having its foreleg and one of its hind legs marked with white, while the other hind leg is left unmarked. Perhaps a word has dropped out of this hadith."Qadi Iyad, in Mashariq 2:252, mentioned many opinions in explaining it.