Abstract
Claims that Islam teaches substitutionary atonement based on the Abu Musa hadith collapse under close reading. By tracing the report’s three formulations, its placement in Sahih Muslim, and its explanation by al-Baihaqi, al-Nawawi, Ibn Ḥajar, and others, this article shows that the narrations describe reciprocal outcomes—not vicarious punishment. The explicit mention of Jews and Christians likewise reflects contextual intelligibility rather than theological exception. What appears polemically explosive dissolves into a coherent Qur’anic and hadith-based framework.
1. Introduction
One of the recurring points in Muslim–Christian polemical exchanges is the doctrine of substitutionary atonement, central to Christian theology, which holds that God chose to enter the world in human form and to suffer in order to redeem others. The doctrine has, however, long been recognised within Christian theology itself as morally and philosophically contested; as William Lane Craig notes, “the doctrine of penal substitution, ever since the time of Faustus Socinus (1539–1604), has faced formidable, and some would say insuperable, philosophical challenges,” particularly in relation to questions of justice and moral responsibility.
In recent years, however, some Christian polemicists have attempted to reverse the critique by pointing to a cluster of hadith reports which, when read superficially, appear to suggest that Muslims will be spared punishment on the Day of Judgment while Jews and Christians will be punished “in their stead.” On this basis, Islam is portrayed as affirming a form of substitution no less troubling than the Christian doctrine it rejects.
Among Muslims, reactions to this argument have varied. Some, driven by apologetic anxiety, are tempted to cast doubt on the authenticity of the reports altogether. Others—more grounded in the tradition—recognise the reports as authentic but insist that they cannot be read in isolation from the Qur’an or from the explanatory framework provided by mainstream scholarship.
2. One Report, Multiple Narrations
The narrations under discussion are not independent reports. They all stem from a single Companion, Abu Musa al-Ashʿari, transmitted primarily through his son Abu Burda, and they appear together in Sahih Muslim in a discernible sequence. Taken collectively, they present three distinct narrative formulations of the same report.
2.1 The Ransom Formulation
The form appearing at the head of the sequence in Sahih Muslim is how most narrators relate the report:
عن أبي موسى، قال: قال رسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم: إذا كان يوم القيامة، دفع الله عز وجل إلى كل مسلم، يهوديا، أو نصرانيا، فيقول: هذا فكاكك من النار
~
Abu Musa reported that Allah’s Messenger (ﷺ) said: When it will be the Day of Resurrection, Allah would deliver to every Muslim a Jew or a Christian and say: That is your rescue (fikakuk) from Hell-Fire.[1]
Some narrations use the word “your ransom” (fida’uk) instead.[2] There is no contention about the narrative authenticity of this formulation.
For ease of reference, this may be called the Ransom Formulation, as it frames the outcome in terms of ransom/rescue rather than process.
2.2 The In-Place Formulation
Next comes a closely related form transmitted by Abu Burda’s son Sa‘id and ‘Awn, which restates the same outcome using locational language:
أن عونا، وسعيد بن أبي بردة، حدثاه أنهما شهدا أبا بردة يحدث عمر بن عبد العزيز، عن أبيه، عن النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم، قال: «لا يموت رجل مسلم إلا أدخل الله مكانه النار، يهوديا، أو نصرانيا»، قال: فاستحلفه عمر بن عبد العزيز بالله الذي لا إله إلا هو ثلاث مرات، أن أباه حدثه عن رسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم، قال: فحلف له
~
Abu Burda reported on the authority of his father that Allah’s Messenger (ﷺ) said: No Muslim would die but Allah would admit in his stead a Jew or a Christian in Hell-Fire. ‘Umar b. ‘Abd al-‘Aziz made him swear by Allah besides Whom there is no god but He, thrice, that his father had narrated that to him from Allah’s Messenger (ﷺ).[3]
This wording may be referred to as the In-Place Formulation, as its emphasis lies on place rather than burden or guilt. There is nothing adverse about its isnād. Some have argued that ʿUmar b. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz’s insistence on repeated confirmation reflects doubt, but this is not quite accurate. While he sought to verify that Abu Musa had indeed narrated it in this form from the Prophet (ﷺ), an earlier compilation records that Abu Burda’s affirmation only pleased ʿUmar (fa-surra bi-dhālika ʿUmar).[4] Another source records that ‘Umar had arranged for writing the hadith reports Abu Barda related from his father.[5]
A fuller version of this formulation—transmitted through a weak chain—explicitly situates it within an extended Day of Judgment narrative.[6]
2.3 The Burden Formulation
Finally, there is a formulation transmitted through Ghilan b. Jarir, via Abu Talha al-Rasibi, which expands the imagery further:
حدثنا حرمي بن عمارة، حدثنا شداد أبو طلحة الراسبي، عن غيلان بن جرير، عن أبي بردة، عن أبيه، عن النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم قال: «يجيء يوم القيامة ناس من المسلمين بذنوب أمثال الجبال، فيغفرها الله لهم ويضعها على اليهود والنصارى» فيما أحسب أنا. قال أبو روح: لا أدري ممن الشك، قال أبو بردة: فحدثت به عمر بن عبد العزيز فقال: أبوك حدثك هذا عن النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم؟ قلت: نعم
~
Abu Burda reported Allah’s Messenger (ﷺ) as saying: There would come people amongst the Muslims on the Day of Resurrection with as heavy sins as a mountain, and Allah would forgive them and he would place the sins upon the Jews and the Christians. This is how I recall it. Abu Ruh said: I do not know as to who is in doubt. Abu Burda said: I narrated it to ‘Umar b. ‘Abd al-‘Aziz, whereupon he said: Was it your father who narrated it to you from Allah’s Messenger (ﷺ)? I said: Yes.[7]
This may be termed the Burden Formulation. As for its narrative authority, it should be noted that, apart from the explicit doubt expressed by one of its transmitters, the narrator Abu Talha Shaddad al-Rasibi is known to have erred in his reporting. In this instance, his wording stands in variance with the versions transmitted by several narrators who were markedly stronger than him in precision and retention.[8] That Muslim b. Hajjaj placed this formulation last in the sequence is significant. As he notes in the introduction to his Sahih, and as later scholars have shown, Muslim sometimes included narrations with defects in particular aspects, arranging them deliberately, such that reports with defects in their isnād were typically mentioned later.[9] The placement of the Burden formulation at the end thus signals that it is to be read with caution and in light of the surrounding narrations.
3. Problematisation of the Report
The report appears problematic on at least two counts. First, taken at face value, it seems to violate the Qur’anic principle that “no bearer shall bear the burden of another” (Qur’an 6:164; 17:15; 35:18; 39:7; 53:38). Second, the specific singling out of Jews and Christians —rather than unbelievers more generally—appears anomalous, and calls for explanation.
4. The Classic Lens: The Hadith of Two Abodes
Traditional Muslim scholarship, however, does not see these narrations as violating the Qur’anic dictum against the transfer of sin and guilt. Rather, they are read through a conceptual framework rooted in an authentically transmitted Prophetic teaching.
عن أبي هريرة، قال: قال رسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم: ما منكم من أحد إلا له منزلان: منزل في الجنة، ومنزل في النار، فإذا مات، فدخل النار، ورث أهل الجنة منزله، فذلك قوله تعالى: {أولئك هم الوارثون} [المؤمنون: 10]
~
Narrated Abu Huraira, the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) said: There is no one among you except that he has two abodes: one in Paradise and one in Hell. If he dies and enters Hell, the people of Paradise inherit his abode.” (Qur’an 23:10)[10]
Abu Huraira further clarified its implication:
يرثون مساكنهم ومساكن إخوانهم الذين أعدت لهم إذا أطاعوا الله
~
They will inherit their own dwellings and the dwellings of their brothers (in humanity) which were prepared for them had they obeyed Allah.[11]
This conceptual framework is reinforced by another well-known hadith narrated by Anas b. Malik.[12]
Taken together, these reports establish a governing principle: every person has two potential abodes, one in Paradise and one in Hell. The final outcome determines which abode is realised and which remains unrealised. When a person ends up in Hell, his unrealised place in Paradise is inherited by those who believed and acted righteously—an idea explicitly alluded to in the Qur’anic description of the believers as “the inheritors” (Qur’an 23:10).
This same logic operates in the reverse direction. When a believer enters Paradise, his unrealised place in Hell is filled by someone who belongs there by virtue of his own disbelief and deeds. It is this latter situation that the Abu Musa narrations describe using the figurative language of fidāʾ (ransom) and fikāk (rescue).
The underlying idea is the same in both cases: the filling of unrealised abodes, not the transfer of guilt or punishment for the wrongdoings of others. Each person ends up where his own belief and deeds lead him, while occupying the place left vacant by the other.
Abu Bakr al-Baihaqi (d. 458/1066) makes this explicit when he frames the ransom language as estimative rather than literal in his comment on the hadith of two abodes.
ويشبه أن يكون هذا الحديث تفسيرا لحديث الفداء، والكافر إذا أورث على المؤمن مقعده من الجنة، والمؤمن إذا أورث على الكافر مقعده من النار يصير في التقدير كأنه فدي المؤمن بالكافر، والله أعلم.
~
It is as though this hadith is a commentary to the hadith of Ransom. As a believer fills a disbeliever’s dwelling in Paradise, and a disbeliever fills a believer’s dwelling in Hell, it is, in a sense, like a ransom for a believer through a disbeliever. Allah knows best![13]
Thus, it is all about the reciprocal occupation of unrealised abodes—not because one bears the sins of the other.
Al-Nawawi (d. 676/1277) builds on the same framework and gives it its clearest formulation: when the believer enters Paradise, his place in Hell is filled by a disbeliever who deserves it on account of his disbelief and sins. In this limited sense alone is the disbeliever called the believer’s “rescue from the Fire”: the believer was liable to punishment, but divine mercy spared him, while Hell is filled by those who belong there by their own deeds.[14]
At this point, a natural question arises: why are people shown, and made to occupy, the unrealised abodes of others at all?
Yet another Prophetic report supplies the answer. Abu Huraira narrates that the Prophet (ﷺ) said:
عن أبي هريرة، قال النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم: لا يدخل أحد الجنة إلا أري مقعده من النار لو أساء، ليزداد شكرا، ولا يدخل النار أحد إلا أري مقعده من الجنة لو أحسن، ليكون عليه حسرة
~
None will enter Paradise except that he is shown the place he would have occupied in the Fire had he done evil, so that he may increase in gratitude; and none will enter the Fire except that he is shown the place he would have occupied in Paradise had he done good, so that it becomes a cause of regret for him.[15]
Commenting on this narration, Ibn Ḥajar al-ʿAsqalani (d. 852/1449) explains that the language of ransom in the Abu Musa narrations is to be understood figuratively in light of this hadith. Seeing the punishment he narrowly escaped intensifies the believer’s gratitude for divine mercy, while seeing the bliss he forfeited intensifies the disbeliever’s regret. The reciprocal occupation of unrealised abodes thus serves a moral and didactic function—not the transfer of guilt or vicarious punishment. [16]
Read in this way, the narrations preserve both elements simultaneously: vivid eschatological imagery and the Qur’anic axiom that no bearer shall bear another’s burden.
5. On the Burden Formulation
The above effectively resolves the difficulty in the Ransom Formulation and the In-Place Formulation; however, the Burden Formulation seems too straightforward in its meaning of shifting the guilt, and it thus also casts aspersion on the explanation offered for the first two formulations of the hadith. Noting that believers would come with mountain loads of sins, it directly states:
فيغفرها الله لهم ويضعها على اليهود والنصارى
~
Allah would forgive them, and he would place the sins upon the Jews and the Christians.
In traditional Muslim scholarship, while some held that this formulation did not warrant extended engagement,[17] others went further, explaining it in light of established Qur’anic principles. Al-Nawawi comments:
فمعناه أن الله تعالى يغفر تلك الذنوب للمسلمين ويسقطها عنهم ويضع على اليهود والنصارى مثلها بكفرهم وذنوبهم فيدخلهم النار بأعمالهم لا بذنوب المسلمين ولا بدمن هذا التأويل لقوله تعالى ولا تزر وازرة وزر أخرى
~
It means Allah will forgive these sins for the Muslims and will remove the burden of sins from them. And the like of it (i.e. the burden of sins) will be put on the Jews and Christians due to their disbelief and their sins. And they will be made to enter the Hell-Fire because of their own deeds and not for the sins of the Muslims. And this interpretation is expedient due to the word of the Almighty, “And no bearer of burden shall bear the burden of another.”[18]
A contemporary scholar, Muhammad Taqi Usmani, elaborates on this in a much simpler wording;
ليس معناه أن اليهود والنصارى يحملون من الذنوب ما ارتكبها المسلمون، لأن ذالك مخالف لصريح قوله تعالى: (وَلاَ تَزِرُ وَازِرَةٌ وِزْرَ أُخْرَى) بل مراد أن اليهود والنصارى يوضع عليهم ذنوبهم، فى حين المسلمين المذكورين لا يوضع عليهم ذنوبهم، بل يغفرلهم
~
It does not mean that Jews and Christians will bear the sins that the Muslims commit, for it goes against the clear word of Allah, “No bearer of burden shall bear the burden of another” [6:164]. The meaning, in fact, is that the Jews and Christians will bear the burden of their own sins, while the Muslims will not bear any sins; rather, Allah will forgive their sins for them.
Continuing his comment on the words “He would place it on the Jews and the Christians”, he hits the bull’s eye and writes;
فضمير المؤنث فى (يَضَعُهَا) راجع إلى جنس الذنوب، لا إلى آحادها التى ارتَكبها المسلمون
~
The pronoun “it” (-hā) here denotes sins as such, not the particular sins committed by the Muslims.[19]
This point becomes clearer when the expanded wording in other sources is taken into account, where the command about sins reads: “Remove them from the believers, place them upon the Jews and Christians, and admit the believers into Paradise by My mercy.”[20] The sequence itself is instructive: forgiveness and removal of sins come first, and entry into Paradise is attributed explicitly to divine mercy, not to any exchange or transfer of guilt.
We have already noted the significance of Muslim’s placement of this formulation after the other two in terms of narrative reliability. It is further noteworthy that Muslim b. Ḥajjāj immediately follows it with a narration from ʿAbdullah b. ʿUmar that unfolds within a Day of Judgment setting closely aligned with one extended rendering of the In-Place Formulation noted above. In that report, the believer is drawn near to his Lord, his sins are privately acknowledged, concealed, and forgiven, and he is then given his record of good deeds. Read in sequence, this juxtaposition constrains the meaning of “placing sins upon others”, ruling out any literal transfer of moral liability and limiting it to a contrast of outcomes after forgiveness has already occurred. In this way, Muslim’s careful sequencing allows a potentially misleading formulation to be read through a clearer, governing narration.
6. Contextual Intelligibility: Why Jews and Christians Are Named
A further question naturally arises: why are only the Jews and Christians mentioned in these narrations, rather than disbelievers in general?[21] One plausible explanation is that the underlying conceptual framework was already familiar within the Judeo-Christian religious milieu to which these communities belonged.
Notably, early rabbinic literature preserves an idea strikingly similar to the one articulated in the Prophetic reports discussed above. As noted by Alan F. Segal, a tradition attributed to R. Akiba (d. 135) explained:
He created the righteous and created the wicked; He created the Garden of Eden and created Gehinnom. Everyone has two portions, one in the Garden of Eden and one in Gehinnom. The righteous person, being meritorious, takes his own portion and his fellow’s portion in the Garden of Eden. The wicked person, being guilty, takes his own portion and his fellow’s portion in Gehinnom. R. Mesharsheya said: What is the biblical proof for this? In the case of the righteous, it is written: “Therefore in their land they shall possess double” [Isaiah 61:7]. In the case of the wicked, it is written: “And destroy them with double destruction” [Jeremiah 17:18].[22]
The relevance of this passage lies in showing that the notion of dual abodes and reciprocal inheritance was already intelligible within the Jewish—and by extension Judeo-Christian—religious imagination. Read against this backdrop, the explicit mention of Jews and Christians in the hadith reflects contextual intelligibility rather than a doctrinal claim that others are exempt.
7. An Ancillary Application of the Two-Abodes Framework
At this point, it may be useful to note that the conceptual framework of dual allotments is not confined to the Abu Musa narrations alone. A related, though significantly weak, report recorded by Ibn Majah goes as:
عن أبي أمامة، قال: قال رسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم: «ما من أحد يدخله الله الجنة، إلا زوجه الله عز وجل ثنتين وسبعين زوجة، ثنتين من الحور العين، وسبعين من ميراثه من أهل النار، …
~
It was narrated from Abu Umamah that the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) said: “There is no one whom Allah will admit to Paradise, but Allah will marry him to seventy-two wives, two from houris and seventy from his inheritance from the people of Hell, …[23]
Despite its sheer weakness, al-Munawi (d. 1031/1622) offers an explanation according to which this “inheritance” does not relate to any transfer of moral liability or attribution of guilt. Rather, it reflects the idea of unrealised allotments—in this case, spouses prepared for individuals who ultimately enter Hell.[24] In short, the notion of unrealised allotments is understood to extend to all bounties of the abode of eternal bliss.
8. Conclusion
The Abu Musa narrations do not support a doctrine of substitutionary atonement. Read in their full narrative range, sequence, and classical reception, they describe neither transferred guilt nor vicarious punishment, but the reciprocal occupation of unrealised abodes after judgment has already been rendered. The language of fidāʾ and fikāk functions figuratively, marking contrast of outcome rather than moral substitution. This reading, articulated by al-Baihaqi, al-Nawawi, and Ibn Ḥajar, is reinforced by Muslim’s deliberate arrangement of reports that constrain potentially misleading formulations.
Nor does the mention of Jews and Christians introduce doctrinal inconsistency. The framework presumes individual accountability and employs a religious vocabulary already intelligible within the Judeo-Christian milieu, reflecting continuity rather than rupture in revealed moral teaching. Properly situated, the reports affirm—rather than undermine—the Qur’anic principle that no bearer carries the burden of another, a moral axiom equally articulated in earlier scripture: “The soul that sins shall die” (Ezekiel 18:20), alongside the privileging of obedience and mercy over sacrificial displacement (1 Samuel 15:22; Hosea 6:6) and the New Testament’s Parable of the Prodigal Son (Gospel of Luke 15:11–32), where forgiveness is granted freely, without substitution or transferred punishment. Ultimately, salvation comes only through Allah’s mercy, which encompasses all things (Qur’an 7:156).
References & Notes:
[1] Muslim b. Hajjaj, al-Sahih, Hadith 2767-49; on the authoirty of Talha b. Yahya from Abu Barda. It is also narrated on the authority of:
- ‘Abd al-A‘la b. Abi al-Musawir. See, Ibn Majah, al-Sunan, Hadith 4291
- Buraid b. ‘Abdullah. See, Ahmad b. Hanbal, al-Musnad, Hadith 19600
- Sa‘id b. Abi Burda. See, Al-Bazzar, al-Musnad, Hadith 3101
- Abu Wahb Walid b. ‘Uqba. See, Al-Bazzar, al-Musnad, Hadith 3198
- Isma‘il b. Abi Khalid. See, Al-Bazzar, al-Musnad, Hadith 3199
- ‘Abdul Malik b. ‘Umaid. See, Al-Tabarani, al-Mu‘jam al-Awsat, Hadith 1
- ‘Amr b. Qaid al-Sakuni. See, Al-Tabarani, Musnad al-Shamiyyin, Hadith 2550
- Abu Hanifa. See, Abu Nu‘aim, Musnad Abi Hanifa, 155
It is likewise reported from Abu Musa through other than Abu Burda, directly by:
- Nasr b. ‘Alqama. See, Al-Tabarani, Musnad al-Shamiyyin, Hadith 465, 2494
- ‘Urwa b. ‘Abdullah b. Qushair. See, Al-Tabarani, al-Mu‘jam al-Awsat, Hadith 2257
[2] Ahmad b. Hanbal, al-Musnad, Hadith 19600, 19650, 19670, 19675
[3] Muslim b. Hajjaj, al-Sahih, Hadith 2767-50
[4] Ahmad b. Hanbal, al-Musnad, Hadith 19600;
It is also possible that ‘Umar b. ‘Abd al-‘Aziz’s interest in this report reflects sensitivity to its theological and explanatory weight rather than doubts concerning its transmission. Given his documented engagement with interreligious questions—most notably the correspondence attributed to him with the Byzantine emperor Leo III—‘Umar may have been attentive to narrations whose imagery intersected with themes familiar within the Judeo-Christian milieu, as discussed in Section 6 below. This remains conjectural; however, the depth and scope of that correspondence render the suggestion plausible. See Seonyoung Kim, The Arabic Letters of the Byzantine Emperor Leo III to the Caliph ʿUmar Ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAziz: An Edition, Translation and Commentary (PhD diss., Catholic University of America, 2017).
[5] Al-Baghindi, Abu Bakr, Musnad Amir al-Mu’minin ‘Umar bin ‘Abd al-‘Aziz, (Damascus: Mo’assasa ‘Ulum al-Qur’an, 1404 AH) Hadith 62
[6] Ahmad b. Hanbal, al-Musnad, Hadith 19654-119655; ‘Abd b. Humaid, al-Muntakhab min Musnad, Hadith 540; Al-Darimi, Abu Sa‘id, Al-Radd ‘ala al-Jahmiyya, (Kuwait: Dar ibn al-Athir, 1995) Hadith 180
[7] Muslim b. Hajjaj, al-Sahih, Hadith 2767-51
[8] Al-Baihaqi, Abu Bakr, Shu‘ab al-Iman, Ed. Dr ‘Abd al-Aliy ‘Abdul Hamid Hamid (Riyadh: Maktaba al-Rushd, 2003) Vol.1, 574; Al-Albani, Nasir al-Din, Silsala al-Ahadith al-Da‘ifa wa Mawdu‘a, (Riyadh: Maktaba al-Ma‘arif, 1992) Vol., 667 Hadith 5399.
[9] See, Sahih Muslim, Translated by Nasiruddin al-Khattab, (Riyadh: Darussalam Publishers, 2007) Vol.1, 42 (Intro.); ‘Awwama, Muhammad, Min Manhaj al-Imam Muslim fi ‘Ard al-Hadith al-Mu‘allal fi Sahihihi, (Jeddah: Dar al-Minhaj, 2017) 22-24
[10] Ibn Majah, al-Sunan, Hadith 4341 – graded as sahih by al-Albani and Shu‘aib al-Arna’ut. al-Tabari, Abu Ja’far, Jami‘ al-Bayan ‘an Ta’wil ay al-Qur’an, Ed. Mahmud Muhammad Shakir (Beirut: al-Resalah Publishers, 2000) Vol.19, 12; Al-Baihaqi, Shu‘ab al-Iman, Hadith 373
[11] Al-Tabari, Jami‘ al-Bayan ‘an Ta’wil ay al-Qur’an, Vol.19, 12-13; Al-Hakim, Abu ‘Abdullah, al-Mustadrak, (Beirut: DKI, 1990) Hadith 3485; Al-Baihaqi, al-Ba‘th wa al-Nushur, (Beirut: Markaz al-Khidmat wa al-Abhath al-Thaqafiyya, 1986) Hadith 242
[12] Al-Bukhari, al-Sahih, Hadith 1338, 1374
[13] Al-Baihaqi, Shu‘ab al-Iman, Vol.1, 582
[14] Al-Nawawi, Yahya b. Zakariyya, al-Minhaj Sharh Sahih Muslim b. al-Hajjaj, (Beirut: Dar Ihya’ al-Turath al-‘Arabi, 1392 AH) Vol.17, 85
[15] Al-Bukhari, al-Sahih, Hadith 6569; Ahmad b. Hanbal, al-Musnad, Hadith 10980
[16] Al-‘Asqalani, Ibn Hajar, Fath al-Bari bi Sharh Sahih al-Bukhari, (Beirut: Dar al-Ma‘rifa, 1379 AH) Vol.11, 398
[17] Al-Baihaqi, Shu‘ab al-Iman, Vol.1, 584
[18] Al-Nawawi, al-Minhaj Sharh Sahih Muslim b. al-Hajjaj, Vol.17, 85
[19] Usmani, Muhammad Taqi, Takmila Fath al-Mulhim, (Beirut: Dar Ihya’ al-Turath, 2006) Vol.6, 32
[20] Al-Ruyani, Abu Bakr, al-Musnad, (Cairo: Mo’assasa Qurtuba, 1416 AH) Hadith 506; Al-Hakim, al-Mustadrak, Hadith 193, 7645;
[21] While most narrations explicitly mention “a Jew or a Christian” (yahūdiyyan aw naṣrāniyyan), some transmissions employ broader or alternative designations. Some use “people of religions” (ahl al-adyān) (e.g., Ahmad b. Hanbal, al-Musnad, Hadith 19658), while others use “people of religious communities” (ahl al-milal) (ibid., Hadith 19670), terms which in this context broadly correspond to communities shaped by prior scriptural traditions. One report employs “people of the two scriptures” (ahl al-kitābayn) (al-Tabarani, al-Mu‘jam al-Awsat, Hadith 1). Other versions refer to those “among the protected communities or among the polytheists” (min ahl al-dhimma aw min ahl al-shirk) (‘Abd b. Humaid, al-Muntakhab min Musnad, Hadith 537), and one mentions “the polytheists” (ahl al-shirk) alone (al-Bazzar, al-Musnad, Hadith 3101). A rarer wording uses the term “disbeliever” (kāfir) (al-Tabarani, Musnad al-Shamiyyin, Hadith 2554; al-Baihaqi, al-Ba‘th wa al-Nushur, Hadith 87; Ibn ‘Asakir, Tarikh Dimashq, vol. 65, 199–200), which has been graded sahih by al-Albani (Silsilah Ahadith al-Sahiha, Hadith 1381).
[22] Alan F. Segal, Two Powers in Heaven, (Leiden: Brill, 2002) 22. I am grateful to Zakir Hussain (UK) for bringing this vital information to my attention.
[23] Ibn Majah, al-Sunan, Hadith 4337 – graded as weak by al-Albani and extremely weak by Shu‘aib al-Arna’ut.
[24] Al-Munawi, Zain al-Din Muhammad ‘Abdul Ra’uf, Fath al-Qadir Sharh Jami‘ al-Saghir, (Cairo: Maktaba al-Tijariya al-Kubra, 1356 AH ) Vol.5, 468
