If the narrators of a ḥadīth agree in their wording of transmission,1 or in any other verbal feature,2 or in an action,3 or in some shared quality,4 this is al-musalsal (literally, a chained or serial ḥadīth).5
For example, every narrator says: "I heard so-and-so say: I heard so-and-so," or "so-and-so narrated to us, saying: so-and-so narrated to us." ↩
Such as every narrator's saying: "I heard so-and-so say: 'I bear witness by Allāh that so-and-so did indeed narrate to me…'" through to the end of the chain. ↩
Such as his saying: "We entered upon so-and-so, who fed us dates"; or a mixture of word and action, as in: "so-and-so narrated to me while holding his beard and said: 'I believe in qadar…'" and so on. ↩
For example, the musalsal of fuqahāʾ, of ḥuffāẓ or of those of advanced age (muʿammarīn). ↩
Sharḥ al-Nukhba, p. 95; Tadrīb al-Rāwī, 2/188. ↩
When each of two peers narrates from the other, this is al-mudabbaj (literally, embellished or paired); al-ʿIrāqī, following al-Dāraquṭnī, did not require the two narrators to be peers.
If any one of the attributes of the ṣaḥīḥ or the ḥasan is missing, the ḥadīth is ḍaʿīf (literally, weak).
An accepted report safe from contradiction by another accepted report is al-muḥkam; if it is contradicted, it is mukhtalaf al-ḥadīth.
An omission of two or more consecutive narrators at any point in the chain is al-muʿḍal, one of the four kinds of rejected report rooted in a break in the chain.
