He said, "I traveled," or he said, "Someone who traveled with the zakat collector of the Prophet ﷺ informed me that in the covenant of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ it was written, 'Do not take a suckling young animal, do not combine what is separate, and do not separate what is combined.'"The collector would come to the tribes when their livestock returned to the watering place and would say, "Pay the zakat due on your wealth."A man from among them brought forward a kawmaa she-camel.I said, "Abu Salih, what is a kawmaa?"He replied, "One with a large hump."The collector refused to accept it. The man said, "I would like you to take the best of my camels."But the collector refused to accept it. So the man led forward another camel of lesser quality, and again the collector refused. Then the man led forward yet another of lesser quality than that, and the collector accepted it, saying, "I am taking it, but I fear that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ may be displeased with me, saying to me, 'You went to a man and picked the choicest of his camels.'"
سرت أو قال: أخبرني من سار مع مصدق النبي ﷺ فإذا في عهد رسول الله ﷺ: أن لا تأخذ من راضع لبن ولا تجمع بين مفترق ولا تفرق بين مجتمع. وكان إنما يأتي الحياة حين ترد العلم فيقول أدوا صدقات أموالكم قال: فعمد رجل منهم إلى ناقة كوماء، قال: قلت يا أبا صالح ما الكوماه؟ قال: عظيمة السنام. قال: فأبى أن يقبلها، قال: إني أحب أن تأخذ خير إبلي. قال: فأبى أن يقبلها، قال: فخطم له أخرى دونها، فأبى أن يقبلها، ثم خطم له أخرى دونها. فقبلها وقال: إني آخذها وأخاف أن يجد علي رسول الله ﷺ يقول لي عمدت إلى رجل فتخيرت عليه إبله.
Abu Dawud (1579) and Nasai (2459) both narrated it from the hadith of Hilal bin Khabab, from Maysara Abu Salih, from Suwayd bin Ghafla, and he related it. By this same route, Ahmad (18837) narrated it in abridged form.Hilal bin Khabab was deemed trustworthy by Ahmad, Yahya bin Main, Abu Hatim, and others. Ibn Hibban mentioned him in his book Al-Thiqat and said, "He makes mistakes and contradicts others." He also mentioned him in Al-Duafa and said, "He became confused in his later years, and he would narrate things based on supposition, so it is not permissible to rely on him when he narrates alone." This is how he described him in both books, Al-Thiqat and Al-Duafa.He was, however, corroborated in a second chain of transmission. This is what Abu Dawud (1585) and Ibn Majah (1801) both narrated from the hadith of Sharik, from Uthman bin Abu Zura, from Abu Layla Kindi, from Suwayd bin Ghafla, who said, "The zakat collector of the Prophet ﷺ came to us, so I took his hand and read his written authorization," and he then related the hadith.Ibn Majah added, from the words of the collector, "What land would carry me, and what sky would shade me, if I came to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ having taken the best of the camels of a Muslim man?"Sharik has poor memory, but he was corroborated. It becomes clear from this narration that there is no one between Suwayd bin Ghafla and the zakat collector of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ.His saying "suckling" of milk means a young animal that is nursing on milk, or one that has milk.The prohibition against combining what is separate is so that zakat would not become due on it, and the prohibition against separating what is combined is so that zakat would be waived on it.