14- The end of ḥadīth (335) This ḥadīth and its corroboration from the narration of Anas were weakened among many other authentic ḥadīths by the one called (Ḥassān ʿAbd al-Manān) in a treatise he named "Discussion with the Albanians on the Issue of Prayer between the Columns," in which he, imitating others, concluded that it is permissible to pray between them without necessity, analogizing it to the imam and the individual! This is one of the most invalid analogies on the face of the earth, as is evident to anyone with reason, for it is akin to analogizing the one without excuse to the one with excuse—even if it did not contradict the sunnah—how could it not; the certainty achieved by the congregational prayer between the columns is not achieved by the individual prayer between them?! My intention now is not to refute him in detail from the ḥadīth perspective, let alone the fiqh perspective, for the space is limited—as you see—and the time is even more limited, except to the extent necessary to defend the ḥadīth of the Messenger of Allāh (ṣallá Allāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam). The aforementioned clung to weakening the ḥadīth by citing Abū Ḥātim's statement about the narrator (Hārūn ibn Muslim): "unknown," and the statement of the ḥāfiẓ Ibn Ḥajar: "obscure"! Opposing with these the authentication of those who authenticated and validated his ḥadīth like Ibn Ḥibbān, Ibn Khuzaymah, al-Ḥākim, and al-Dhahabī! He responds to that by saying that these are among the lenient, and as for al-Dhahabī, he is contradictory! The response in the briefest possible terms: No scholar—by virtue of the absence of infallibility—can avoid making mistakes, as is authentically reported from Imām Mālik, whether the mistake is due to leniency, doubt, contradiction, or pure error, and thus it is not permissible to reject a scholar's statement merely by saying he is lenient or contradictory, and this is what the claimant fell into! Firstly, as for al-Dhahabī, he followed up in "al-Mīzān" on Abū Ḥātim's statement regarding "Hārūn":