Huzaifa bin Yaman came to Uthman after having been engaged in military campaigns alongside the people of Iraq against the people of Sham in the conquest of Armenia and Azerbaijan. Huzaifa was alarmed by their differences in recitation, so he said to Uthman, "Commander of the Believers, save this nation before they differ about the Book the way the Jews and Christians differed."So Uthman sent word to Hafsa, asking, "Send us the manuscripts so we may copy them into proper codices, then we will return them to you." Hafsa sent them to Uthman, who then ordered Zayd bin Thabit, Abdullah bin Zubayr, Saeed bin As, and Abdul-Rahman bin Harith bin Hisham to copy them into codices.Uthman said to the three from Quraysh, "Whenever you and Zayd bin Thabit disagree about any part of the Quran, write it in the dialect of Quraysh, for it was revealed in their tongue." They did so. When they had finished copying the manuscripts into codices, Uthman returned the original manuscripts to Hafsa and sent to every region one of the codices they had copied. He then ordered that every other Quranic manuscript or codice be burned.Ibn Shihab said, Kharija bin Zayd bin Thabit informed me that he heard Zayd bin Thabit say, "I missed a verse from Surat al-Ahzab when we were copying the codice, a verse I used to hear the Messenger of Allah ﷺ recite. We searched for it and found it with Khuzayma bin Thabit al-Ansari, 'Among the believers are men who have been true to their covenant with Allah' [Ahzab 33:23]. So we placed it in its proper surah in the codice."
أن حذيفة بن اليمان قدم على عثمان، وكان يغازي أهل الشام، في فتح أرمينية وأذربيجان، مع أهل العراق، فأفزع حذيفة اختلافهم في القراءة، فقال حذيفة لعثمان: يا أمير المؤمنين، أدرك هذه الأمة قبل أن يختلفوا في الكتاب اختلاف اليهود والنصارى، فأرسل عثمان إلى حفصة أن أرسلي إلينا بالصحف، ننسخها في المصاحف، ثم نردها إليك، فأرسلت بها حفصة إلى عثمان، فأمر زيد بن ثابت، وعبد الله بن الزبير، وسعيد بن العاص، وعبد الرحمن بن الحارث بن هشام، فنسخوها في المصاحف، وقال عثمان للرهط القرشيين الثلاثة: إذا اختلفتم أنتم وزيد بن ثابت في شيء من القرآن، فاكتبوه بلسان قريش، فإنما نزل بلسانهم، ففعلوا، حتى إذا نسخوا الصحف في المصاحف رد عثمان الصحف إلى حفصة، وأرسل إلى كل أفق بمصحف مما نسخوا، وأمر بما سواه من القرآن في كل صحيفة، أو مصحف أن يحرق. قال ابن شهاب: وأخبرني خارجة بن زيد بن ثابت، سمع زيد بن ثابت، قال: فقدت آية من الأحزاب حين نسخنا المصحف، قد كنت أسمع رسول الله ﷺ يقرأ بها، فالتمسناها فوجدناها مع خزيمة بن ثابت الأنصاري: {من المؤمنين رجال صدقوا ما عهدوا الله عليه} [الأحزاب: ٢٣] فألحقناها في سورتها في المصحف.
Bukhari narrated it in the Virtues of the Quran (4987–4988) from Musa, he said, Ibrahim narrated to us (he is Ibn Saad Zuhri), he said, Ibn Shihab narrated to us, that Anas bin Malik told him, and he related it.His saying, "Ibn Shihab said, Kharija bin Zayd bin Thabit informed me..." and so on, is connected to the first chain of narration, as if Ibrahim bin Saad combined the two hadiths within a single context. In one of them is the hadith of Anas bin Malik about the compilation of the Quran during the time of Uthman, may Allah be pleased with him, and in the second is the account of Zayd bin Thabit missing a verse from Surah Ahzab during the time of Abu Bakr, may Allah be pleased with him.Khatib holds that this was a mistake on his part, and that he merged some chains of narration into others. Hafiz mentioned this in Fath al-Bari (12/9).But if it is understood that Ibrahim narrated the hadith of Anas together with the account of Uthman in the same way that he narrated the missing verse of Zayd bin Thabit from Surah Ahzab, from Ibn Shihab, from Kharija bin Zayd bin Thabit, from his father, then the chain of narration would be sound. This is what Bukhari intended when he combined the two accounts within a single context.Zayd bin Thabit mentioned two hadiths. In one of them are two verses from Surah Tawbah, "There has certainly come to you a Messenger from among yourselves. Grievous to him is what you suffer, and he is full of concern for you, and to the believers he is kind and merciful" [Tawbah 9:128], and in the second, "Among the believers are men who have been true to what they pledged to Allah" [Ahzab 33:23].Zayd bin Thabit did not rely solely on his own memorization, but held back until someone else bore witness for him. As for the testimony of Khuzayma bin Thabit, it was given on account of what was written down, even though what he and others had memorized was the same.