and both of them have been deemed reliable despite some weakness, and the rest of the narrators are those of the authentic collections." I say: The isnād of Ibn Khuzaymah is free from these two weak narrators, and ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ṣāliḥ frequently narrated from al-Layth—who is Ibn Saʿd—and he was his scribe. Were it not for some negligence in him, his narration from him would be among the strongest narrations. In any case, he is a follower of the two reliable narrators in the narration of Ibn Khuzaymah, thus adding strength to the ḥadīth. And Allāh knows best. Then I saw that Ibn Khuzaymah also narrated it with another isnād from al-Layth, saying (pp. 158-159): "Yūnus ibn ʿAbd al-Aʿlá narrated to us, saying: Yaḥyá—meaning Ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Bukayr—narrated to us, saying: al-Layth narrated to me..." and so on. I say: This isnād is authentic according to the criteria of Muslim. (Benefit): His saying (ṣallá Allāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam): "They sought help from Adam," means: they asked him (peace be upon him) to supplicate for them and intercede for them with Allāh (exalted is He). There are many well-known ḥadīths with this meaning in the "Ṣaḥīḥayn" and other collections. It does not imply the permissibility of seeking help from the dead, as many of the misguided innovators imagine! Rather, it is akin to seeking help from the living in what they are capable of, as in His saying: *"So the one who was from his faction sought his help against the one who was from his enemy..."* (Sūrah al-Qaṣaṣ, 28:15). It is clearly evident that it is not permissible, for example, for a capable living person to say to a restrained, incapacitated person: Help me! Thus, the dead person who is sought for help instead of Allāh is even more incapable, so whoever opposes this is either a foolish madman or a forsaken polytheist because he believes his deceased is hearing, seeing, and capable of all things. Herein lies the danger because it is major shirk, which is what the people of tawḥīd fear for these individuals