When al-Daraqutni cites a hadith in his book *Al-Ilal* that contradicts the consensus of the trustworthy narrators and hinges on a weak narrator

The questioner : In my study of *Al-Ilal* by Imam al-Daraqutni, I sometimes find that a hadith hinges on a weak man, and the group of narrators have narrated the hadith from this weak man in a specific form or wording, while the individual trustworthy narrator contradicts the group regarding this weak man by narrating it in a different wording, or by adding to the chain of narration, or by subtracting from it—meaning he contradicts in the chain or in the text. Sometimes we see Imam al-Daraqutni attribute the error to this trustworthy narrator, saying, "So-and-so made a mistake, and this is an anomalous narration," even though we have someone who bears the responsibility before him, namely this weak man on whom the chain hinges. Why is that? I mean, in such a case, there is a trustworthy narrator, and there is someone who bears the responsibility, but in other places, he returns the responsibility to this weak man and says, "Due to his inconsistency, the group narrated it in this form and the individual in the other form." But my question is about the first scenario: why is it said that the trustworthy narrator is anomalous or made a mistake, when there is someone more deserving of that description? I know that he sometimes says this about those whose weakness he has explicitly stated, such as Yazid ibn Abi Ziyad. A hadith was mentioned and the chain hinges on him, so the one below him was considered to have made a mistake, and Yazid spoke about it—Imam al-Daraqutni himself?

The Shaykh : I have two answers.

The questioner : Please.

The Shaykh : The first answer is half of the knowledge; I do not know. The other answer rests on the question: is the weakness of that narrator in that specific place, or is it in your mind that he is weak in his view?

The questioner : I do not remember it now, and I do not know. I do not know now.

The Shaykh : So I say it is possible. First, I rule out—I rule out all the confusion—that in the place where he weakens this narrator, he attributes the error to the trustworthy narrator who narrated from the weak narrator. I strongly rule this out. Second, what I imagine is that it was not in the mind of al-Hafiz al-Daraqutni that this narrator was weak in his view. Therefore, he and his school go to the extent of attributing the error to the trustworthy narrator who contradicted the trustworthy ones. This trustworthy narrator shared with the trustworthy ones in narrating from that man who is weak in your view and weak in al-Daraqutni's view, as he explicitly stated in other places. But I imagine that when he attributed the error to the trustworthy narrator who narrated from this weak man, it was not in his mind at that moment that the one he weakened was weak in his view. So he took the contradiction of this trustworthy narrator against the trustworthy ones and attributed the contradiction to him, whereas, as I said, it should be attributed to this weak, defective narrator. If you find an example where he explicitly stated the weakness of this one at the same time, I strongly rule that out. As I said, on some occasions, he is only a human being.

The questioner : So this is the second half of the knowledge. May Allah bless you.

The Shaykh : And may He reward you.