4819 — ‘Uthmān ibn Abī Shaybah narrated to us, Yazīd ibn Hārūn narrated to us, Hammād ibn Salamah informed us, from Thābit, from Anas: that a woman who had some impairment in her mind — with the same meaning (1).

14 — Chapter on the spaciousness of the gathering place (2)

4820 — Al-Qa‘nabī narrated to us, ‘Abd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī al-Mawāl narrated to us, from ‘Abd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī ‘Amrah al-Anṣārī, from Abū Sa‘īd al-Khudrī, who said: I heard the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, say: "The best of gatherings are the most spacious of them." (3)

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(1) Its chain of transmission is sound. Muslim also recorded it (2326) from Abū Bakr ibn Abī Shaybah, from Yazīd ibn Hārūn, with this chain. In his narration it is mentioned that he was alone with her on some of the roads. Al-Nawawī said in "Sharḥ Muslim" 15/83: meaning, he stood with her on a traveled path to fulfill her need and give her a legal ruling in seclusion, and this was not the seclusion with a foreign woman, for this was in a place where people passed and saw him with her, though they could not hear her words. It is also in "Musnad Aḥmad" (14046) and "Ṣaḥīḥ Ibn Ḥibbān" (4527). See also what precedes it.

(2) This chapter heading we have established from (H), and it is indicated there that it is in the narration of Ibn al-A‘rābī.

(3) Its chain of transmission is sound. Al-Qa‘nabī: he is ‘Abd Allāh ibn Maslamah. It is found with al-Bayhaqī in "al-Ādāb" (307) from the path of the author, with this chain. ‘Abd ibn Ḥumayd also recorded it (981), and al-Qudā‘ī in "Musnad al-Shihāb" (1223) from the path of ‘Abd Allāh ibn Maslamah al-Qa‘nabī, with it. Aḥmad recorded it in his "Musnad" (11137) and (11663), al-Bukhārī in "al-Adab al-Mufrad" (1136), al-Qudā‘ī in "Musnad al-Shihāb" (1222), al-Khaṭīb in "al-Jāmi‘ li-Akhlāq al-Rāwī wa Ādāb al-Sāmi‘" 2/64, al-Ḥākim in "al-Mustadrak" 4/269, and al-Bayhaqī in "al-Shu‘ab" (8241) from multiple paths, from ‘Abd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī al-Mawāl, with it. Some of them added an addition in their narration.