Mudtarib (inconsistent report)

"Knowing the mudtarib hadith" is the nineteenth type in Ibn al-Salah: a mudtarib hadith is one whose narration varies, some relating it one way and others another way that contradicts it. ^{1 2}

Ibn al-Salah says it is called mudtarib only when the two versions are equal; if one prevails so that the other cannot match it — because its narrator has better memory, kept longer company with the one he narrates from, or on another recognised ground — the ruling goes to the stronger, and the hadith is then neither called mudtarib nor treated as such. ²

Inconsistency can occur in the text or in the chain, and it can come from a single narrator or from several. ² It makes the hadith weak because it signals that it was not well preserved. ² It is close to the defective (mu'allal); in the preceding type Ibn al-Salah notes that some variants called defects are not damaging, such as a mursal version of a hadith that a trustworthy, precise narrator gives with a full chain. ¹

Ibn al-Salah cites Isma'il ibn Umayya's hadith from Abu Amr ibn Muhammad ibn Hurayth from his grandfather Hurayth from Abu Hurayra that one who prays and finds no stick to set up before him should draw a line. Bishr ibn al-Mufaddal and Rawh ibn al-Qasim relate it from Isma'il in this form; Sufyan al-Thawri from him from Abu Amr ibn Hurayth from his father; Humayd ibn al-Aswad from Isma'il from Abu Amr ibn Muhammad ibn Hurayth ibn Sulaym from his father; Wuhayb and Abd al-Warith from Isma'il from Abu Amr ibn Hurayth from his grandfather Hurayth; and Abd al-Razzaq from Ibn Jurayj says Isma'il heard it from Hurayth ibn Ammar — and, says Ibn al-Salah, there is more inconsistency in it than this. ^{2 3}