The meeting of Shaykh Al-Albani with Shaykh 'Abd al-Rahim Sadiq during his journey for 'Umrah in the last days of the month of Rajab.
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The Shaykh : ... Indeed, travel brings many benefits to its traveler, among which is that it may be written for the traveler to meet a group or some of the people of knowledge. And Allah, Blessed and Exalted is He, has written for me to perform 'Umrah in the last days of the past month of Rajab and to meet with some of the scholars in the Noble Makkah who have a strong view in participating in the science of the Sunnah and hadith. There is no doubt that meeting with such people brings many benefits to a student of knowledge like me, and among that is being alerted by such those who are engaged in the science of hadith and the Sunnah to some of the things in which one may have erred or made a mistake. And indeed, I benefited in this journey with benefits that I saw it was obligatory upon me to alert you to, because it concerns pointing out an error of mine that occurred in the hadith number three hundred and eight of "Silsilat al-Ahadith al-Sahihah". Therefore, I hope that everyone who has this book "Silsilat al-Ahadith al-Sahihah" will take this alert regarding the hadith number three hundred and eight. The text of this hadith is the well-known one: Sunan Ibn Majah 4126Da’if (Darussalam) The first thing I mentioned in its tracing was my following statement: "It was narrated by 'Abd ibn Humayd in the selection from the Musnad", and I mentioned the page, which is the tenth after the hundred, and the second aspect, and I said: "Then 'Abd ibn Humayd said: Ibn Abi Shaybah narrated to us, and Waki' narrated to us from Hammam from Qatadah from Abu 'Ayyash al-Aswari from Abu Sa'id: 'Love the poor, for I heard the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) say in his supplication,' and he mentioned it."
I said: "And this is a good chain in my opinion, all its narrators are trustworthy men of the two Shaykhs", to the end of it. So that noble man, whose name is 'Abd al-Rahim Sadiq, alerted me, and we must mention the virtue for its rightful owner, we must attribute it to its owner. And from the virtue of this man is that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, has bestowed upon him much wealth, which he spent on traveling to many Islamic countries and others to obtain manuscripts in the science of hadith and the Sunnah and to photograph them. And so, many precious books became available to him that we have not even come across until now. I am not now in the position of explaining these benefits that we gained from looking at the index of this noble man, in which he collected the names of those books photographed in his possession, but I am in the position of mentioning this error that he alerted me to. He said, and he was truthful in what he said, that when I attributed this hadith to 'Abd ibn Humayd in his Musnad, your eye moved from the text of this chain to this text. This chain is the chain of 'Abd ibn Humayd that I recited for you, and its text is not the hadith. And this hadith has a chain other than this chain, and they are one after the other. So when I transferred this text, instead of my eye landing on the second chain which is in this text, my eye moved to a chain before it for another text of another hadith. And this other hadith is , which is also from the hadith of Abu Sa'id al-Khudri. And this is the Musnad of 'Abd ibn Humayd, or the selection from it; its style in mentioning hadiths is on the method of the Musnads, because its origin is a Musnad, and the Musnads present hadiths from one Companion in a continuous sequence without regard to chapters or any system: "So-and-so narrated to me from so-and-so from Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, he said: The Messenger of Allah said such and such," a second chain with a second hadith, and a third, and so on. So the error that he alerted me to is this: this text does not have this chain; rather, it has another chain. And naturally, I said to him: It is necessary to research and verify, for the sake of scientific verification, because he showed me a copy he had obtained, written in a very beautiful handwriting that resembles the handwriting of the known Mushafs today. I said: I cannot now agree to the correctness of this correction or to its error until we return to the old copies that we have, fearing that this copy might be an error. And indeed, the first thing I did when I returned to the library was to review two copies I have of the Musnad of 'Abd ibn Humayd, or the selection from the Musnad of 'Abd ibn Humayd, and my error and the correctness of that noble man became clear to me. Therefore, I saw it as good to hasten in presenting this note, fearing that we may not be able to reprint the book soon, and before it is reprinted, and it may not be reprinted, Allah knows best. So I see that you should preserve this from me first, and that the absent should be informed, to clear the conscience. Up to here ends my alert regarding my error in transferring this chain to this hadith.
The questioner : ... .
The Shaykh : Listen, my brother, listen to half the speech with the answer. I did not say "up to here ends the explanation of my error" except because the speech has a continuation. A question naturally arises here: after we have known that this chain which I graded as good is not for this text, what is the state of the chain of this hadith that should have been here and did not occur for a wisdom that Allah wills? And among the most prominent of these wisdoms is that you know that the Shaykh makes mistakes, just as I did... It is not that the Shaykh and the Shaykhs are like me, of course, neither are they better than me nor am I better than them. This is from the wisdom: that you know that infallibility belongs to Allah, Mighty and Majestic, alone. You know, but to be sure of that.
So what is the value of this chain that should have been placed here instead of this one? The answer is: this chain is weak, while this one is good. And based on my previous misconception that this good chain is the chain of this hadith, I summarized the speech regarding the remaining hadiths or chains with this hadith in my statement here: "And the hadith has another route from Abu Sa'id, and corroborations from Anas ibn Malik, 'Ubadah ibn al-Samit, and Ibn 'Abbas, all of which I traced in" *Irwaa' al-Ghalil* "number such and such, and I preferred to present this route here because, with the soundness of its chain, it is rare", to the end of it. So this soundness has gone, it has crashed. The true chain for this text is weak.
So what is the ruling on this hadith? The answer will be in the next session, because the current situation, after we have lost this chain upon verification, requires re-examining the individual elements of those routes and the mentioned corroborations. Their chains or individual elements may be weak with a slight weakness that is compensated by the totality of their routes, or the matter may be otherwise. Because we always and forever alert, following the scholars of hadith, that the hadith which is strengthened by the multiplicity of routes requires that these routes not be severely weak. In this tracing, I did not devote myself to this aspect, namely explaining whether these routes are severely weak or moderately weak. But now, after this ruling has been revealed, it is necessary to study the individual elements of these routes. Either their weakness is slight and is compensated by their totality, or it is otherwise. If it is the former, the hadith remains to be relied upon, but not in the rank of authenticity, because the basis for authenticating it was based on this chain, and as we said, it has gone and crashed. But it will be in the rank of good for other reasons. And perhaps these routes will not reach the level of strengthening the hadith to this rank. So the answer from this perspective, or in brief: does this hadith remain in the share of the book "Silsilat al-Ahadith al-Sahihah" after explaining this error, or is it transferred from here to the other book? I hope that the answer to this will be in the next meeting, if Allah wills. This is what I wanted to alert you to in the short, tight time.
What is left...? A quarter of an hour?
O Allah, cause me to live poor and cause me to die poor, and gather me among the poor (on the Day of Resurrection).
اللهم أحيني مسكينا، وأمتني مسكينا، واحشرني في زمرة المساكينI said: "And this is a good chain in my opinion, all its narrators are trustworthy men of the two Shaykhs", to the end of it. So that noble man, whose name is 'Abd al-Rahim Sadiq, alerted me, and we must mention the virtue for its rightful owner, we must attribute it to its owner. And from the virtue of this man is that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, has bestowed upon him much wealth, which he spent on traveling to many Islamic countries and others to obtain manuscripts in the science of hadith and the Sunnah and to photograph them. And so, many precious books became available to him that we have not even come across until now. I am not now in the position of explaining these benefits that we gained from looking at the index of this noble man, in which he collected the names of those books photographed in his possession, but I am in the position of mentioning this error that he alerted me to. He said, and he was truthful in what he said, that when I attributed this hadith to 'Abd ibn Humayd in his Musnad, your eye moved from the text of this chain to this text. This chain is the chain of 'Abd ibn Humayd that I recited for you, and its text is not the hadith
O Allah, keep me alive in a state of poverty
اللهم احيني مسكيناO Allah, keep me alive in a state of poverty
اللهم احينني مسكيناVisit the sick and follow the funeral processions
عودىوا المرض واتبعوا الجنائزThe questioner : ... .
The Shaykh : Listen, my brother, listen to half the speech with the answer. I did not say "up to here ends the explanation of my error" except because the speech has a continuation. A question naturally arises here: after we have known that this chain which I graded as good is not for this text, what is the state of the chain of this hadith that should have been here and did not occur for a wisdom that Allah wills? And among the most prominent of these wisdoms is that you know that the Shaykh makes mistakes, just as I did... It is not that the Shaykh and the Shaykhs are like me, of course, neither are they better than me nor am I better than them. This is from the wisdom: that you know that infallibility belongs to Allah, Mighty and Majestic, alone. You know, but to be sure of that.
So what is the value of this chain that should have been placed here instead of this one? The answer is: this chain is weak, while this one is good. And based on my previous misconception that this good chain is the chain of this hadith, I summarized the speech regarding the remaining hadiths or chains with this hadith in my statement here: "And the hadith has another route from Abu Sa'id, and corroborations from Anas ibn Malik, 'Ubadah ibn al-Samit, and Ibn 'Abbas, all of which I traced in" *Irwaa' al-Ghalil* "number such and such, and I preferred to present this route here because, with the soundness of its chain, it is rare", to the end of it. So this soundness has gone, it has crashed. The true chain for this text is weak.
So what is the ruling on this hadith? The answer will be in the next session, because the current situation, after we have lost this chain upon verification, requires re-examining the individual elements of those routes and the mentioned corroborations. Their chains or individual elements may be weak with a slight weakness that is compensated by the totality of their routes, or the matter may be otherwise. Because we always and forever alert, following the scholars of hadith, that the hadith which is strengthened by the multiplicity of routes requires that these routes not be severely weak. In this tracing, I did not devote myself to this aspect, namely explaining whether these routes are severely weak or moderately weak. But now, after this ruling has been revealed, it is necessary to study the individual elements of these routes. Either their weakness is slight and is compensated by their totality, or it is otherwise. If it is the former, the hadith remains to be relied upon, but not in the rank of authenticity, because the basis for authenticating it was based on this chain, and as we said, it has gone and crashed. But it will be in the rank of good for other reasons. And perhaps these routes will not reach the level of strengthening the hadith to this rank. So the answer from this perspective, or in brief: does this hadith remain in the share of the book "Silsilat al-Ahadith al-Sahihah" after explaining this error, or is it transferred from here to the other book? I hope that the answer to this will be in the next meeting, if Allah wills. This is what I wanted to alert you to in the short, tight time.
What is left...? A quarter of an hour?