A man broke his fast during Ramadan, so the Prophet ﷺ ordered him to make expiation by freeing a slave, or fasting two consecutive months, or feeding sixty needy people.The man said, "I cannot find the means."Then a basket of dates was brought to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, who said, "Take this and give it away in charity."The man replied, "Messenger of Allah, there is no one more in need than me."The Messenger of Allah ﷺ laughed until his molars showed, then said, "Eat it."
أن رجلا أفطر في رمضان، فأمره النبي ﷺ أن يكفر بعتق رقبة، أو صيام شهرين متتابعين، أو إطعام ستين مسكينا، فقال: لا أجد، فأتى رسول الله ﷺ بعرق تمر، فقال: خذ هذا فتصدق به. فقال: يا رسول الله، ما أحد أحوج مني. فضحك رسول الله ﷺ حتى بدت أنيابه، ثم قال: كله.
Malik narrated it in the Book of Fasting (29), and through his route Muslim narrated it in the Book of Fasting (1111:83), from Ibn Shihab, from Humayd bin Abdul-Rahman bin Awf, from Abu Hurairah, and he mentioned it. It came in this unrestricted form.He also narrated it through the route of Ibn Jurayj, who said, "Ibn Shihab told me, from Humayd bin Abdul-Rahman, that Abu Hurairah told him that the Prophet ﷺ ordered a man who had broken his fast during Ramadan to free a slave, or fast two months, or feed sixty poor people."Ibn Khuzayma (1943) said, after narrating it through the route of Malik, and Malik said at the end of his report, "He had broken his fast through intercourse."I say, this is what is established by the sahih narrations, for those who narrated this hadith from Zuhri restricted it to intercourse, and they are greater in number, as Daraqutni said in Ilal (10/227), where he mentioned their names.Bayhaqi said, "The narration of the group from Zuhri is restricted to intercourse." He said in another place, "Twenty of the memorizing companions of Zuhri narrated it mentioning intercourse," and indeed this number reached, according to Ibn Hajar, more than forty. See Fath al-Bari (4/163).Unlike the version giving a choice, although a group followed him in that, whom Daraqutni mentioned (2397), but he said, "A greater number than them opposed them and narrated it from Zuhri with this chain, that the breaking of that man's fast was through intercourse, and that the Prophet ordered him to atone by freeing a slave, and if he could not find one, then fasting two months, and if he was unable, then feeding sixty poor people." Then he mentioned these narrators, and their number reached more than thirty people.As for what was narrated from Abu Hurairah, "that a man ate during Ramadan, so the Prophet ﷺ ordered him to free a slave, or fast two months, or feed sixty poor people," this is daif. Daraqutni narrated it (2308) through the route of Abu Mashar, from Muhammad bin Kaab Qurazi, from Abu Hurairah, and he mentioned it. Daraqutni said, "Abu Mashar is Najih, and he is not strong."There was disagreement regarding the addition of his ordering him to make up a day in place of it in this hadith. Abu Dawud narrated it (2393), and from him Daraqutni (2305), and Ibn Khuzayma (1954), and Bayhaqi (226), all of them from the hadith of Hisham bin Saad, from Ibn Shihab, from Abu Salama bin Abdul-Rahman, from Abu Hurairah, who said, "A man came to the Prophet ﷺ, having broken his fast during Ramadan," with this hadith. He said, then a basket containing dates, about fifteen sa in measure, was brought. And he said in it, "Eat it, you and your household, and fast one day, and seek Allah's forgiveness."Hisham bin Saad is the Madinan, who is disputed, except that his hadith is hasan when he does not contradict others, because he was accused of poor memory. Here he contradicted others in the chain, and added in the text, which is his saying, "and fast one day." Therefore Ibn Khuzayma said, "This chain is a mistake."But Bayhaqi strengthened it from two angles. One of them is that this was narrated from Saeed bin Musayab, from the Prophet ﷺ. This is what Malik narrated in the Book of Fasting (30), from Ataa bin Abdullah Khurasani, from Saeed bin Musayab, that he said, "A Bedouin came to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, striking his chest and pulling out his hair, saying, 'The most wretched of men is ruined!' The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said to him, 'What is it?' He said, 'I had intercourse with my wife while I was fasting in Ramadan.' The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, 'Can you free a slave?' He said, 'No.' He said, 'Can you offer a sacrificial camel?' He said, 'No.' He said, 'Then sit down.'" Then the Messenger of Allah ﷺ was brought a basket of dates, and he said, "Take this and give it in charity." The man said, "I do not find anyone more in need than myself." He said, "Eat it, and fast one day in place of what you did."Malik said, Ataa said, "So I asked Saeed bin Musayab, 'How many dates were in that basket?' He said, 'Between fifteen and twenty sa.'"This mursal narration was narrated by Abu Dawud in his Marasil (103-2), and Bayhaqi (4/227), both of them through the route of Malik. Abu Dawud said, "Malik erred regarding the name of Ataa's father, he is not the son of Abdullah."I say, it is as he said, for Ataa is the son of Abu Muslim, and his father's name was Maysara, though it is also said Abdullah, so perhaps Malik chose the weaker view. The important thing is that there is no dispute that he is the Khurasani.Ibn Majah (1671) and Bayhaqi (4/226) narrated it as a raised hadith, from the hadith of Abdul-Jabbar bin Umar, from Yahya bin Saeed, from Saeed bin Musayab, from Abu Hurairah, and he mentioned it.Bayhaqi also narrated it (4/226) through the route of Abu Marwan, who said, "Ibrahim bin Saad narrated to us," from two angles. And he said, "Abu Uways Madani also narrated it, from Zuhri," then he traced its chain from him.Abdul-Jabbar bin Umar also followed him, from Zuhri, from Humayd bin Abdul-Rahman, from Abu Hurairah, and Abdul-Jabbar bin Umar is daif, as I said.He said, "This was also narrated in the hadith of Amr bin Shuayb, from his father, from his grandfather." Then he, along with Imam Ahmad (6945) and Ibn Khuzayma (1955), narrated it through the route of Hajjaj bin Artah, from Amr bin Shuayb, from his father, from his grandfather, similar to the hadith of Zuhri from Humayd bin Abdul-Rahman, from Abu Hurairah, the hadith about the incident, and he added to it. Amr said, "And he ordered him to make up a day in its place."Ibn Khuzayma found fault with it based on something that is not a real flaw, saying, "Husayn bin Mahdi narrated to us, Abdul-Razzaq narrated to us, Ibn Mubarak informed us, who said, 'Hajjaj bin Artah did not hear anything from Zuhri.'" I say, here Hajjaj did not narrate from Zuhri, he only narrated it from Amr bin Shuayb.In summary, this addition has other routes that Ibn Hajar mentioned in Talkhis (2/207), and in Fath al-Bari (4/172), and he said, "By gathering these routes, it becomes known that this addition has a basis." But Sheikh Islam bin Taymiya said that this addition is daif, and it was deemed daif by more than one of the memorizers of hadith. Fatawa (25/225).Abdul-Haqq said in his Ahkam (2/231), "The hadith about making up the day is only sahih as a mursal narration, and Malik also narrated it this way, and it is among the mursal narrations of Saeed bin Musayab." Malik narrated it from Ataa bin Abdullah Khurasani, from Saeed bin Musayab, and he mentioned the story, and said, "Eat it, and fast one day in place of what you did."Hafiz bin Qayyim said in Tahzib Sunan (3/273), after quoting Abdul-Haqq's statement, "What the memorizers of hadith rejected is the mention of this phrase in the hadith of Zuhri, for his reliable and trustworthy companions... none of them mentioned this phrase, rather only the weak narrators mentioned it from him, but he transmitted from Daraqutni that these narrators are trustworthy." Then he said, "The trustworthiness of the narrator is a condition for the soundness of the hadith, but not a guarantee of it, rather there must also be the absence of a hidden flaw and irregularity, and these two are not absent in this phrase." End of quote.Those who declared it sahih went on to accept this addition based on the rule, "an addition by a trustworthy narrator is accepted," which none of the critics of hadith dispute, they only differ in its application and in stipulating certain conditions for its acceptance.As for the jurists, the majority of them held that making up the day is obligatory on him, among them Malik, Ahmad, Abu Hanifa, and Shafii in his most apparent view. Shafii has another view, that making up the day is not obligatory on him if he atones, and he has a third view, that if he atones by fasting, then no making up is required of him, but if he atones by freeing a slave or by feeding, then he must make up the day. This is also the view of Uzai.