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Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies 11 (2011)
importantly, ʿAlī b. Saʿīd is known to have practised tadlīs. 93 According
to al-Dāraquṭnī, he related single traditions not supported by parallel
lines of transmission (tafarrada bi-ashyāʾ in ; ḥaddatha bi-aḥādīth a lamyutābaʿ
ʿalay-hā). 94 If the biographical information about ʿAlī b. Saʿīd
should be lent credence, it suggests that he may have devised the isnād
to Hushaym b. Bashīr.
Beside the single-strand isnāds, Ibn Ḥanbal and Saʿīd b. Manṣūr are
direct CRs of Hushaym b. Bashīr. 95 Saʿīd b. Manṣūr differs from the
other traditions in the Hushaym cluster mainly in employing the locution
taghrīb u ʿām in instead of the attested nafy u sana/ʿām. The taghrībversion
is scattered over various clusters of the non-revelation tradition
and cannot be associated with a specific PCL, or CL for that matter. It is
conceivable that Saʿīd b. Manṣūr knew the tradition from Hushaym and
altered the matn inadvertently under the influence of another variant
tradition, which was known to him from a different source.
Ibn Ḥanbal’s no. 22666 is completely identical with the variant of
Yaḥyā b. Yaḥyā al-Tamīmī. It stands to reason that both traditionists
collected a same tradition from a common source, which can be safely
associated with Hushaym b. Bashīr.
Our analysis of the cluster through Hushaym b. Bashīr (Diagram 2, p.
175) has succeeded in evincing two unambiguous PCLs, namely Yaḥyā
b. Yaḥyā al-Tamīmī and Qutayba b. Saʿīd. At the same time, neither
Yaʿqūb al-Dawraqī nor ʿAmr b. ʿAwn can be ascertained as PCLs of
Hushaym b. Bashīr. Note however that the number of isnāds converging
in Yaḥyā b. Yaḥyā and Qutayba b. Saʿīd exceeds the number of
attributions to Yaʿqūb al-Dawraqī and ʿAmr b. ʿAwn. In terms of
quality, the attributions to Yaḥyā and Qutayba are superior: their analysis
exhibits no isnād irregularities, whereas both traditions through ʿAmr b.
ʿAwn are based on confused collective lines of transmission. The
evidence of the CLs is seconded by the existence of two CRs, to wit, Ibn
Ḥanbal and Saʿīd b. Manṣūr who quote Hushaym b. Bashīr in an
unmediated way. Therefore, Hushaym is best seen as the actual CL of
the currently studied variant tradition.
The existence of a variant going back to Hushaym b. Bashīr (d.
183/799) shows that the non-revelation tradition existed around the
93 Ibn Ḥajar, Lisān, 5:343.
94 Ibid., 5:342–3.
95 Ibn Ḥanbal, Musnad, 37:338, no. 22666; Saʿīd b. Manṣūr, Sunan, ed. Saʿd b.
ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Ḥumayyid, 6 vols. (1st ed., Riyadh: Dār al-Ṣumayʿī
li-l-Nashr wa-l-Tawzīʿ, 1414/1993), K. al-Tafsīr, 3:1191, no. 594.