An error in a name in a narration in Imām Muslim’s Ṣaḥīḥ!

Imām Muslim narrated in his Ṣaḥīḥ (no. 183):

Suwayd ibn Saʿīd narrated to us, he said: Ḥafṣ ibn Maysarah narrated to us, from Zayd ibn Aslam, from ʿAṭāʾ ibn Yasār, from Abū Saʿīd al-Khudrī — that some people during the time of the Messenger of Allāh ﷺ said: “O Messenger of Allāh, will we see our Lord on the Day of Resurrection?” The Messenger of Allāh ﷺ said: “Yes.” He said: “Do you suffer any difficulty in seeing the sun at noon on a clear day without clouds? Or do you suffer any difficulty in seeing the moon on a full-moon night when there are no clouds?” They said: “No, O Messenger of Allāh.” He said: “Then you will not suffer any difficulty in seeing Allāh, Blessed and Exalted, on the Day of Resurrection, just as you do not suffer any difficulty in seeing one of them...” (The rest of the lengthy ḥadīth follows.)

Muslim said:

I read this ḥadīth on intercession to ʿĪsā ibn Ḥammād Zughbah al-Miṣrī, and I said to him: “I will narrate this ḥadīth from you that you heard it from al-Layth ibn Saʿd?” He said: “Yes.” I said to ʿĪsā ibn Ḥammād: “Did al-Layth ibn Saʿd narrate it to you from Khālid ibn Yazīd, from Saʿīd ibn Abī Hilāl, from Zayd ibn Aslam, from ʿAṭāʾ ibn Yasār, from Abū Saʿīd al-Khudrī — that he said: ‘We said: O Messenger of Allāh, will we see our Lord?’ So the Messenger of Allāh ﷺ said: ‘Do you find any difficulty in seeing the sun on a clear day?’ We said: ‘No.’” Then I continued narrating the ḥadīth to its end, and it was similar to the narration of Ḥafṣ ibn Maysarah, except that it included the addition: “...without any deed they did, nor any step they took forward; it will be said to them: ‘For you is what you have seen and its like with it.’”

Then it says:

Abū Saʿīd said: “It has reached me that the bridge (al-jisr) is finer than a hair and sharper than a sword.”

The same wording appears in Ibn Ḥibbān’s Ṣaḥīḥ:

“Abū Saʿīd said: It has reached me...”

According to this narration, the Abū Saʿīd mentioned at the end of the ḥadīth is al-Khudrī.

Al-Ḥumaydī said in al-Jamʿ bayna aṣ-Ṣaḥīḥayn (2/439):

“Abū Saʿīd al-Khudrī said: ‘It has reached me that the bridge is finer than a hair and sharper than a sword.’”

Ibn Ḥajar said in Fatḥ al-Bārī (11/454):

“In Muslim it appears: ‘Abū Saʿīd said: It has reached me that the Ṣirāṭ is sharper than a sword and finer than a hair.’ And in the narration of Ibn Mandah through this same route it appears: ‘Saʿīd ibn Abī Hilāl said: It has reached me...’ Al-Bayhaqī also transmitted it from Anas, from the Prophet ﷺ, as a marfūʿ (attributed) report — though there is weakness in its chain. Ibn al-Mubārak narrated it as a mursal from ʿUbayd ibn ʿUmayr: ‘Indeed, the Ṣirāṭ is like a sword, and on both of its sides are hooks — a single hook snatches more than the tribes of Rabīʿah and Muḍar.’ Ibn Abī ad-Dunyā narrated it from this same route adding: ‘...and the angels are on both sides saying: O Lord, grant safety, grant safety.’ Al-Fuḍayl ibn ʿIyāḍ said: ‘It has reached us that the Ṣirāṭ is a journey of fifteen thousand years — five thousand ascending, five thousand descending, and five thousand level. It is finer than a hair and sharper than a sword, stretched across Hell. None will cross it except one lean and thin from the fear of Allāh.’ Ibn ʿAsākir reported it in his biography, and it is muʿḍal (severely disconnected) and not authentic. And from Saʿīd ibn Abī Hilāl: ‘It has reached us that the Ṣirāṭ will be, for some people, finer than a hair, and for others like a vast valley.’ Ibn al-Mubārak and Ibn Abī ad-Dunyā narrated it, and it is mursal or muʿḍal.”

Clarifying the attribution

I (the author) say:

The “Abū Saʿīd” mentioned in the narration of ʿĪsā ibn Ḥammād Zughbah from al-Layth is not the Companion al-Khudrī! ʿĪsā ibn Ḥammād made an error here. The one intended is Saʿīd ibn Abī Hilāl, one of the narrators of the ḥadīth.

This was clarified by ad-Dāraqutnī in Ruʾyat Allāh (no. 4), who narrated it through Abū Ṣāliḥ, the scribe of al-Layth, and Yaḥyā ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Bukayr — both from al-Layth ibn Saʿd, from Khālid ibn Yazīd, from Saʿīd ibn Abī Hilāl, from Zayd ibn Aslam, from ʿAṭāʾ ibn Yasār, from Abū Saʿīd al-Khudrī... (the ḥadīth).

At the end of it:

“Saʿīd ibn Abī Hilāl said: It has reached me that the bridge is finer than a hair and sharper than a sword.”

Thus, Abū Ṣāliḥ and Yaḥyā ibn ʿAbd Allāh differed from ʿĪsā ibn Ḥammād and attributed the statement correctly to Saʿīd ibn Abī Hilāl, the narrator of the ḥadīth.

Ibn al-Mubārak also narrated it in az-Zuhd wa’r-Raqāʾiq (2/122) from Rishdīn ibn Saʿd, from ʿAmr ibn al-Ḥārith, from Saʿīd ibn Abī Hilāl who said:

“It has reached me that the Ṣirāṭ, on the Day of Resurrection, will be for some people finer than a hair and for others like a wide valley.”

This narration is muʿḍal as Ibn Ḥajar said, and nothing authentic exists describing the Ṣirāṭ (or bridge) over Hell as “finer than a hair and sharper than a sword.” All reports mentioning this are either mursal or muʿḍal.

Note on Suwayd ibn Saʿīd

Note:

Some people weaken the ḥadīth of Suwayd ibn Saʿīd (which Muslim included) due to the weakness of Suwayd! This is the attitude of those who do not understand isnād and the statuses of narrators!

For although Suwayd was spoken about by some scholars, he has been followed up in this very ḥadīth.

Al-Bukhārī narrated it in his Ṣaḥīḥ through Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, from Ḥafṣ ibn Maysarah, from Zayd ibn Aslam — exactly as Muslim narrated it from Suwayd ibn Saʿīd, from Ḥafṣ ibn Maysarah.

There are also other routes from Zayd ibn Aslam. Thus, the ḥadīth is well-known and Ṣaḥīḥ.