Abbas asked the Prophet ﷺ for permission to pay his charity before it was due, and he granted him permission to do so.Mura said, "He allowed him to do that."
أن العباس سأل النبي ﷺ في تعجيل صدقته قبل أن تحل، فرخص له في ذلك. قال مرة: فأذن له في ذلك.
Abu Dawud (1624), Tirmidhi (678), and Ibn Majah (1795) all narrated it through the route of Saeed bin Mansur, who said, "Ismail bin Zakariya narrated to us, from Hajjaj bin Dinar, from Hakam, from Hujayya bin Adi, from Ali," and he related it. Ahmad (822), Ibn Khuzayma (2331), and Hakim (3/332) also narrated it through this same route.Tirmidhi said, Hasan. He also said, "This hadith has also been narrated from Hakam bin Utayba, from the Prophet ﷺ, as a mursal narration." End of quote.Abu Dawud said following his narration of the hadith, "Hushaym narrated this hadith from Mansur bin Zazan, from Hakam, from Hasan bin Muslim, from the Prophet ﷺ, and Hushaym's hadith is more sahih."This is also what Daraqutni, Bayhaqi, and others favored, because there is disagreement regarding Hakam bin Utayba. Hajjaj bin Dinar narrated from him with his chain, and Hajjaj bin Dinar was graded daif by Daraqutni, though others considered him acceptable. Hujayya bin Adi is truthful but makes mistakes, and he is among the narrators found in the Sunan collections.Given that this account has been narrated through many different routes and channels, it is most likely that Hujayya bin Adi did not err in relating it. This is supported by what the two sahih collections narrated, as mentioned earlier, because the Prophet's statement ﷺ in the hadith of Abu Hurairah, "As for Abbas, it is upon me," has been interpreted to mean, it is a loan I owe him, because I had borrowed from him the zakat of two years in advance.Hafiz, after discussing the various narrations concerning the advance payment of his zakat, said, "The establishment of this account regarding the advance payment of Abbas's zakat is not far-fetched when considering the totality of these routes." Fath al-Bari (3/334). I say, it also has another interpretation, as mentioned in the same reference.As for those who favored the mursal version, this does not undermine those who favored the connected version, since it contains additional information. This is why Tirmidhi, Baghawi, and others graded it hasan.The majority of scholars adopted this position regarding the permissibility of paying zakat in advance before the completion of the year, among them Zuhri, Uzai, Shafii, Ahmad, Ishaq, and the jurists of reasoned opinion. Malik said it is not permissible to pay it in advance, and if one did pay it early, it must be repeated. See Sharh al-Sunnah (6/32).