Ahmad 7646

Its chain of transmission is sahih. Ibn Tawus is Abdullah bin Tawus Yamani, whose reliability was already established at 1940, and we add here that Ibn Saad included his biography in 5/397, as did Ibn Abu Hatim in 88/2/2-89.This hadith is transmitted here in the form of a report stopping at Abu Hurairah, in the narration of Tawus from Abu Hurairah, but it carries the ruling of a report raised to the Prophet, since it is something that could not be known through personal opinion or analogy. Moreover, it has indeed also been established as raised to the Prophet. Bukhari narrated it in 3/166 and 6/315-316 through Abdul-Razzaq, from Mamar, from Ibn Tawus, from his father, from Abu Hurairah, as a stopped report. Then Bukhari added, in the second location, right after it, "He said, 'Mamar also informed us, from Hammam, who said, "Abu Hurairah narrated to us, from the Prophet ﷺ, something similar."'"Muslim did likewise, narrating it in 2/225-226 through Abdul-Razzaq, from Mamar, from Ibn Tawus... as a stopped report. Then he narrated it right after that, through Abdul-Razzaq, from Mamar, from Hammam bin Munabbih, from Abu Hurairah, as a report raised to the Prophet, and he gave its wording, from Hammam's narration, a second time. A similar version will come at 8157, within the Sahifah of Hammam bin Munabbih, as a report raised to the Prophet.Ammar bin Abu Ammar, the freedman of Banu Hashim, also narrated it from Abu Hurairah as a report raised to the Prophet, and it will come at 10917 and 10918. Tabari likewise narrated it in his Tarikh 1/224, through the narration of Ammar. Hafiz referred, in Fath al-Bari 6/315, to this narration of Ammar as found in Ahmad and Tabari. Hafiz also mentioned that the narration of Abdul-Razzaq, from the hadith of Tawus from Abu Hurairah as a stopped report, is the well-known version from Abdul-Razzaq. Muhammad bin Yahya raised it to the Prophet from him, also in the narration of Tawus, and Ismaili recorded it.I say, stronger than this, closer, and more firmly established, is that the imam Ishaq bin Rahawayh also narrated it from Abdul-Razzaq, from the hadith of Tawus from Abu Hurairah, as a report raised to the Prophet. Ibn Hibban narrated it in his Sahih [2/296-297 of the manuscript of Taqasim wal-Anwa], and [p. 73-74 of the manuscript of Ihsan], through Ibn Rahawayh, from Abdul-Razzaq.Ibn Hibban titled this hadith "Mention of a report through which whoever is denied the good fortune to grasp its meaning reviles those who adorn themselves with the sunnahs of the Chosen One ﷺ." Then, after narrating it, he said, "Allah sent His Messenger ﷺ as a teacher for His creation, and placed him in the position of clarifying His intent. So he ﷺ conveyed His message, and explained His signs with concise and detailed words, which his companions, or some of them, understood from him. This report is among the reports whose meaning is grasped by whoever has not been denied the good fortune to attain the truth."That is, Allah sent the Angel of Death to Musa with a message of trial and testing, and commanded him to say to him, 'Answer your Lord,' a command of testing and trial, not a command Allah intended to carry out, just as He commanded His close friend Ibrahim, may Allah's peace be upon our Prophet and upon him, to slaughter his son, a command of testing and trial, not the command Allah intended to carry out. So when he resolved to slaughter his son, and laid him down on his forehead, He ransomed him with a great sacrifice."Allah sent the angels to His messengers in forms they did not recognize, as when the angels entered upon Ibrahim and he did not recognize them, until he felt afraid of them, and as when Jibreel came to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and asked him about faith and Islam, and the Chosen One ﷺ did not recognize him until he had left. So the coming of the Angel of Death to Musa was not in the form Musa used to recognize him by. Musa was a jealous man, and when he saw in his house a man he did not recognize, he took hold of his hand and struck him, and his strike landed on the eye of the form the angel had taken, not the form in which Allah created him."And since what is explicitly stated from our Prophet ﷺ in the report of Ibn Abbas, where he said, 'Jibreel came to me at the House twice,' and he related the report, saying at its end, 'This is your time and the time of the prophets before you,' contains a clear indication that some of our laws may coincide with some of the laws of the nations before us. And since it is part of our law that whoever puts out the eye of someone who enters his house without his permission, or who peers into his home without his leave, bears no blame and incurs no fault for doing so, based on the general reports concerning this matter, which we have dictated in more than one place in our books, it was permissible for this law to coincide with the law of Musa, by removing the fault from whoever puts out the eye of someone who enters his house without permission. So Musa's use of this action was permissible for him, and he incurred no fault in doing it."So when the Angel of Death returned to his Lord and informed Him of what had happened with Musa, He commanded him a second time with another command, a command of testing and trial, as we mentioned before, when Allah said to him, 'Tell him, if you wish, place your hand on the back of a bull, and for every hair your hand covers you will have a year.' So when Musa, the one who spoke directly with Allah, may Allah's peace be upon our Prophet and upon him, realized that this was the Angel of Death, and that he had come to him with a message from Allah, his soul became content with death, and he did not ask for more time, but said, 'Now, then.'"Had Musa recognized him as the Angel of Death the first time, he would have done what he did the second time, once he was certain and knew who he was, contrary to the claim of whoever alleges that the people of hadith are wood-carriers and night-shepherds, who gather what does not benefit them and narrate what earns them no reward, and who say things that Islam itself invalidates. This is due to his ignorance of the meanings of these reports, and his neglect of proper understanding of the traditions, relying instead on his own inverted opinion and his backward analogy."His saying in the hadith, "He struck him," sakk means striking hard with something broad.His saying, "on the back of a bull," matn means the back, and the word can be used as both masculine and feminine.His saying, "a stone's throw," Hafiz said, meaning the distance of a stone's throw.His saying, "the red sand dune," kathib is a mound of gathered sand, raised in shape.