When Saad bin Abu Waqqas died, the wives of the Prophet ﷺ sent word asking that his bier be brought through the mosque so they could pray over him. This was done, and the bier was placed by their chambers so they could pray over it, then it was taken out through the Gate of the Funerals, which led to the seating area.It reached them that people had criticized this, saying, "Funerals were never brought into the mosque."When this reached Ayesha, she said, "How quick people are to criticize what they have no knowledge of! They criticize us for having a bier passed through the mosque, yet the Messenger of Allah ﷺ prayed over Suhayl bin Bayda nowhere but in the heart of the mosque."
أنها لما توفي سعد بن أبي وقاص أرسل أزواج النبي ﷺ أن يمروا بجنازته في المسجد، فيصلين عليه. ففعلوا. فوقف به على حجرهن يصلين عليه. وأخرج به من باب الجنائز الذي كان إلى المقاعد. فبلغهن أن الناس عابوا ذلك. وقالوا: ما كانت الجنائز يدخل بها المسجد. فبلغ ذلك عائشة فقالت: ما أسرع الناس إلى أن يعيبوا ما لا علم لهم به! عابوا علينا أن يمر بجنازة في المسجد! وما صلى رسول الله ﷺ على سهيل بن بيضاء إلا في جوف المسجد.
Muslim narrated it in the Book of Funerals (973) through several routes from Abdul-Wahid bin Hamza, from Abbad bin Abdullah bin Zubayr, with the same wording. This is the narration of Musa bin Uqba from Abdul-Wahid, while others narrated it from Abdul-Wahid in a shortened form.Dahhak bin Uthman also narrated it, from Abu Nadr, from Abu Salama bin Abdul-Rahman, that when Saad bin Abu Waqqas died, Ayesha said, "Bring him into the masjid so that I may pray over him." This was objected to, so she said, "By Allah, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ prayed over the two sons of Bayda in the masjid, Suhayl and his brother."Muslim said, Suhayl was the son of Daad, that is, the son of Bayda, his mother being Bayda.Nawawi said, "The sons of Bayda were three brothers, Sahl, Suhayl, and Safwan, and their mother was Bayda, whose actual name was Daad, Bayda being a descriptive title. Their father was Wahb bin Rabia the Qurashi, of Banu Fihr. Suhayl was an early convert to Islam, he migrated to Abyssinia, then returned to Makkah, and later migrated to Madinah. He took part in Badr and other battles, and died in the year nine of the Hijrah."This hadith indicates that praying inside the masjid for a funeral is permissible. This was the view held by Shafii, Ahmad, and some companions of Malik, and among the companions it was held by Abu Bakr, Umar, Ayesha, and the wives of the Prophet ﷺ. The funeral prayer was indeed performed for Abu Bakr and for Umar inside the masjid, and no one objected, so this became like a consensus.It likewise indicates that women may attend the funeral prayer when it is held in the masjid, since none of the companions objected to the wives of the Prophet ﷺ doing so, so this too became like a consensus.As for what is reported from Abu Hurairah as a saying of the Prophet, "Whoever prays over a funeral in the masjid gets nothing," with another version saying, "then there is nothing against him," this is daif, because it comes through the narration of Salih, the freed slave of Tawama, from Abu Hurairah. It was narrated by Abu Dawud (3191) and Ibn Majah (1517) and others, through the route of Ibn Abu Dhib, who said, "Salih, the freed slave of Tawama, related to me," and then he mentioned the hadith.Salih, the freed slave of Tawama, underwent a change and became confused in his memory toward the end of his life, and it may be that the variation in the wording of the hadith stems from him. Indeed, this variation is itself a clear sign of his confusion, even though Ibn Abu Dhib had heard from him before this confusion set in, according to the view of most scholars. Bukhari, however, said, "His hearing from him came late, and he transmitted objectionable reports from him." For this reason, the majority of scholars judged this hadith to be daif, among them Imam Ahmad, Ibn Munzir, Ibn Adi, and Khattabi, to the point that Ibn Hibban said in Duafa (1/366), "This is a false report. How could the Chosen One ﷺ declare that whoever prays the funeral prayer gets no reward for it, and then he himself ﷺ prayed over Suhayl bin Bayda inside the masjid?"Given that this hadith of Abu Hurairah is daif, there is no need to try to reconcile it with the sahih hadith of Ayesha, as the eminent scholar Abu Hasan Sindi attempted to do. Reconciliation is only sought when both hadiths are sahih and appear, on the surface, to conflict, as is known in the science of hadith terminology under the heading of "conflicting hadiths." But when one of the two is sahih and the other is daif, then the sahih is given precedence over the daif, as the majority of scholars have held regarding this hadith.Tahawi took a different approach, treating the hadith of Ayesha as abrogated. Bayhaqi responded to this in Marifa (5/320), saying, "Had Abu Hurairah known of any abrogation of what Ayesha reported, he would have mentioned it on the day the funeral prayer was performed for Abu Bakr in the masjid, or on the day it was performed for Umar bin Khattab in the masjid. And whoever objected to Ayesha's instruction to bring the body into the masjid would have mentioned it as well. Or Abu Hurairah himself would have mentioned it when she reported that account. Rather, it was only objected to by someone who had no knowledge of its permissibility, and once she reported the account, they fell silent and did not object to it, nor did they counter it with anything else."For further reading, see Minna Kubra (3/72–74).