Explanation of the Hadith: (When a woman reaches the age of menstruation, it is not permissible for any of her to be seen except her face and her two hands)

The Shaykh : As for the hadith of Asma bint Abi Bakr, when the Messenger (peace be upon him) said to her: , some people stop at this hadith. These are people who have no specialization in the science of hadith and do not expand their efforts to trace the routes of the hadith, especially when the hadith appears in some of its routes in books that are not widely circulated among scholars who are not specialists, as we have mentioned. This hadith is found in one of the four famous books of Sunan, and it is narrated by the Lady Aisha. With this chain of narration, there is no doubt or ambiguity for us that its isnad is weak; because it contains a break, and there is weakness in some of its narrators. This is what we mentioned in the previously mentioned book: "The Hijab of the Muslim Woman in the Book and the Sunnah." However, this hadith has a valid corroborating narration (shahid) according to the scholars of hadith, and it is not from the broken route of Aisha which contains a weak narrator, but rather from another route, from the route of Asma herself, the owner of the story—excuse me—from the route of Asma bint Umayyis. This route is found in "Sunan al-Bayhaqi al-Kubra," and its chain of narration consists entirely of trustworthy men, with no criticism or slighting of them except for one man, who is Abdullah ibn Lahi'ah, the judge of Egypt in his time. It is not hidden from us that more than one scholar of hadith has spoken about this man, but their speech about him was not regarding his truthfulness, but rather regarding his precision and poor memory. They acknowledge his knowledge and virtue. It is sufficient for you to know that he was one of the judges who ruled by the Shari'ah. He was a noble man, but he was struck by a calamity: his library, which was full of hadith books and their parts, was hit by fire and burned. It is the custom of scholars of hadith that when they narrated to people in hadith gatherings, they would review their original sources so that they would deliver the hadith while being fresh with the sources of the hadith, their wordings and their chains of narration. They would study the hadiths they intended to deliver to the people by their texts and chains of narration, then they would come out to them and deliver them. This is what Abdullah ibn Lahi'ah the judge did, as is the case with every scholar of hadith. When his books burned, he had no reference left except his memory. So he began to narrate the hadiths, and errors appeared in them, sometimes in the chain of narration and sometimes in the text. For example, a hadith that was from a Companion and stopped at him (mawquf), he would say: "The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said," assuming so, and he had no remaining reference to the books he had heard from his sheikhs among the hadith scholars to refer to and prepare the lesson before delivering it. So some assumptions and errors appeared from him. It was said in his biography a phrase with the utmost precision: "Abdullah ibn Lahi'ah is truthful, but his memory became poor when his books burned, and his hadith is authentic if narrated by one of the 'Abdullahs." And his hadith is authentic if narrated by the 'Abdullahs; they mean Abdullah ibn Yazid al-Misri, Abdullah ibn Wahb al-Misri, and Abdullah ibn al-Mubarak al-Marwazi. All of these are among the sheikhs of Imam Ahmad. When these 'Abdullahs narrate a hadith from Abdullah ibn Lahi'ah, his hadith is authentic. What is the secret? They said these men narrated from Abu Lahi'ah before his books burned. This is how far the precision of scholars of hadith goes in sifting men, and in investigating and researching their conditions. Abdullah ibn Lahi'ah is truthful but has a poor memory; because his memory became poor after his books burned. But these trustworthy 'Abdullahs only narrated from him before his books burned; that is: when they were receiving hadiths from him and hearing them from him, he was preparing them from his books which had not yet burned. So he would deliver the hadith as he had memorized it recently from his books. After his books burned, some errors appeared in his hadiths—as we said—so the investigating scholars of knowledge said: "The hadith of Ibn Lahi'ah, if it is not from the route of one of the 'Abdullahs whose names we mentioned earlier, his hadith is classified in the rank of a weak hadith, not severely weak."
Rather, it is a moderate weakness, such that it can be strengthened by its coming from another route. In fact, some scholars grade his hadith as good (hasan), merely because Ibn Lahi'ah is in it, saying his hadith is good. And this is at a time when we testify that this is leniency; because most scholars judged his hadith as weak. But should his hadith not be at least good when it has a corroborating narration in "Sunan Abu Dawud" from the hadith of Aisha? And there is no accused narrator in this hadith, but rather there is a break from above, and a little weakness—also—from the side of memory, from a narrator named Sa'id ibn Bashir?
If the hadith of Ibn Lahi'ah does not deserve to be graded as good (hasan) in itself, then it at least deserves to be graded as good for the sake of another when it has a corroborating narration. So when we argue with this hadith, we do not argue by looking only at the hadith that Abu Dawud narrated from Aisha with the weak chain, but rather we argue with this hadith with this additional route of Abdullah ibn Lahi'ah which is in "Sunan Imam al-Bayhaqi."
And finally: Does this hadith not increase in strength and authenticity by our remembering the authentic hadiths that we mentioned earlier, the last of which is the hadith of al-Khath'amiah, when al-Fadl was looking at her, and the Messenger (peace be upon him) did not say to her: ; because covering the face is an awrah (part of the body that must be covered). Rather, he approved her doing so. This confirms the hadith of Aisha and the hadith of Asma bint Umayyis which says: .