The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “Hold fast to my Sunnah and the Sunnah of the Rightly Guided Caliphs after me.”

The questioner: His EminenceThe Shaykh- May Allah preserve you - , he saysThe questioner: He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: , then in another hadith in al-Tirmidhi, he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: ; why did he generalize in the first hadith and specify in the previous one? We ask for clarification, and may Allah reward you with good?

The Shaykh: Do not see a contradiction between the two hadiths, because the lesser does not contradict the greater. We reminded you of the first hadith regarding the division of the Ummah into seventy-three sects, one of which is the saved sect, and its sign is that it holds fast to what the Messenger of Allah and his Companions were upon. This includes the Companions. Then we mentioned to you the second hadith: , and these are included among my Companions, and they are the best of them. Then came this hadith about which the questioner asked,The questioner : in which it is stated that these people also have a special status among the Companions after the Rightly Guided Caliphs. Thus, the total number of those specifically mentioned by name among the Companions of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) in this hadith and that one is six, and they are among his Companions (peace be upon him) who were mentioned in the first hadith. As for the specific mention, there is no doubt that this is a known Arabic style among the people of Arabic grammar; specifying a thing by name means alerting the listeners to the special status of that specified thing. So when he mentioned his Sunnah and coupled it with the four Caliphs, that is a strong indication of the virtue of the Rightly Guided Caliphs. It is no wonder that they were among the ten promised Paradise. Then, when he specified Ibn Mas'ud and those with him, it was to alert that they also have a status in companionship and in knowledge of what the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) was upon. This is a known style.
As we return to say: Why did he specify the Companions in that hadith among the generations that come after the Companions, when he included them all in the authentic, indeed mass-transmitted hadith: ? In this hadith, three generations are mentioned. In the hadith of the sects, the first generation is mentioned. Why did he specify them by name? Because they are the best of the following generations, and so on. Thus, specifying a person, a group, or anything or any ruling by name indicates that it has special care in the Shari'ah. One of the most famous examples that brings this to you is the saying of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him): , . If one does not know this style to which I drew attention just now, one would understand that if a person stands at 'Arafah, then... the Hajj, so he does not have to perform tawaf, nor sa'y, because the Messenger restricted Hajj to standing at 'Arafah. But that is not the case. So why did the Messenger mention Hajj without the other pillars and obligations? They said: That is an indication from him (peace and blessings be upon him) that standing at 'Arafah is one of the greatest pillars of Hajj, and Hajj is not valid without standing at 'Arafah.
Other than that?