4718 — Mūsā ibn Ismāʿīl narrated to us, Ḥammād narrated to us, from Thābit
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= from Muḥammad ibn Abān, from ʿĀṣim, from Zirr, from ʿAbd Allāh ibn Masʿūd. Muḥammad ibn Abān: Abū Dāwūd and Ibn Maʿīn declared him weak, and al-Bukhārī said: "He is not strong." Al-Shāshī mentions a story at the beginning of his narration of it.

It was also transmitted by al-Bazzār (1605) via the path of Abū Aḥmad al-Zubayrī, from Sharīk, from Abū Isḥāq, from ʿAlqamah and Abū al-Aḥwaṣ, from Ibn Masʿūd. Al-Bazzār said: "Thus Sharīk narrated it."

It was also transmitted by Ibn Abī Ḥātim, as reported from him by al-Ḥāfiẓ Ibn Kathīr in his Tafsīr 8/357 (al-Shaʿb edition), from Aḥmad ibn Sinān al-Wāsiṭī, from Abū Aḥmad al-Zubayrī, from Isrāʾīl, from Abū Isḥāq, from ʿAlqamah and Abū al-Aḥwaṣ, from Ibn Masʿūd. This is an isnād whose narrators are all trustworthy, the narrators of the two Shaykhs, except that Isrāʾīl heard from Abū Isḥāq late in his life.

It is corroborated by the ḥadīth of Salamah ibn Yazīd al-Juʿfī, transmitted by Aḥmad in the Musnad (15923), whose narrators are trustworthy. See the complete takhrīj and the full discussion of it there.

In the text of this ḥadīth there is an objectionable element (nakārah), for the mawʾūdah — the girl buried alive — would not have reached puberty, and the texts of the sacred law are mutually corroborative that there is no legal responsibility (taklīf) before puberty.

The correct and chosen position among the verifying scholars of the people of knowledge is that the children of the polytheists who die before puberty are among the people of Paradise. They have adduced as evidence what Ibn Abī Ḥātim transmitted, as reported from him by Ibn Kathīr in his Tafsīr 8/357, from Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ṭahrānī — who is Muḥammad ibn Ḥammād — Ḥafṣ ibn ʿUmar al-ʿAdanī narrated to us, al-Ḥakam ibn Abān narrated to us, from ʿIkrimah, who said: Ibn ʿAbbās said: "The children of the polytheists are in Paradise. Whoever claims that they are in the Fire has lied." God Almighty says: {And when the mawʾūdah is asked (8) for what sin she was killed} [al-Takwīr: 8–9] — he said: she is the one buried alive — and by His saying: {And We were not to punish until We sent a messenger} [al-Isrāʾ: 15]. If the rational adult is not punished for not having received the call, then it is all the more fitting that the non-rational person not be punished.

And by what Aḥmad transmitted (20583) via the path of Ḥasnāʾ bint Muʿāwiyah ibn Salīm, from her uncle, who said: I said: "O Messenger of God, peace and blessings be upon him, who is in Paradise?" He said: "The Prophet — peace and blessings be upon him — is in Paradise, the martyr is in Paradise, the newborn is in Paradise, and the mawʾūdah is in Paradise." Al-Ḥāfiẓ deemed its isnād good in al-Fatḥ 3/246.