with clear evidence, and I am pleased by this occasion to share a remarkable statement I came across in "Siyar Aʿlām al-Nubalāʾ" by al-Dhahabī (9/188): "Yaḥyá ibn Saʿīd (the imam al-Qaṭṭān) said: Do not look at the ḥadīth, but look at the isnād. If the isnād is sound, then [accept it], otherwise do not be deceived by the ḥadīth if the isnād is not sound." And Allāh, the Exalted, is the one who grants success.

- "Indeed, you are today in a time where there are many scholars and few preachers. Whoever abandons ten percent of what he knows has perished. A time will come after you when there are many preachers and few scholars. Whoever holds onto ten percent of what he knows has been saved." It was recorded by al-Harawī in "Dhamm al-Kalām" (1/14-15) through two chains from Muḥammad ibn Ṭafar ibn Manṣūr, who narrated to us from Muḥammad ibn Muʿādh, who narrated to us from ʿAlī ibn Khushram, who narrated to us from ʿĪsá ibn Yūnus, from al-Ḥajjāj ibn Abī Ziyād, from Abū al-Ṣiddīq or Abū Naḍrah—al-Ḥajjāj was uncertain—from Abū Dharr, attributed to the Prophet. I said: This isnād is sound; all its narrators are trustworthy, the men of Muslim, except for this Muḥammad ibn Ṭafar, for whom I have not yet found a biography. He was the obstacle preventing me from authenticating the ḥadīth when I included a similar ḥadīth of Abū Hurayrah in "al-Ḍaʿīfah" (684). Then I found that he was not the only one who narrated it, so I saw it as a matter of scholarly integrity to authenticate it. Al-Bukhārī said in the biography of al-Ḥajjāj ibn Abī Ziyād al-Aswad (1/2/374): "Ibrāhīm ibn Mūsá said: ʿĪsá ibn Yūnus informed us... (I said: He provided the isnād similarly and the first part of its text, then said:) Isḥāq said: al-Muʾammal narrated to us, he heard..