Tacit and Explicit Testimony as proof of abu Ja‘far al-Thani’s (the second)  عليه السلام Divine Authority over the people after abu al-Hassan al-Rida  عليه السلام — report 5

RESEARCH · UNREVIEWED. Source publication is not a certification of authenticity.

hadith

ORIGINAL ARABIC SOURCE TEXT

5ـ بَعْضُ أَصْحَابِنَا عَنْ مُحَمَّدِ بْنِ عَلِيٍّ عَنْ مُعَاوِيَةَ بْنِ حُكَيْمٍ عَنِ ابْنِ أَبِي نَصْرٍ قَالَ قَالَ لِيَ ابْنُ النَّجَاشِيِّ مَنِ الامَامُ بَعْدَ صَاحِبِكَ فَأَشْتَهِي أَنْ تَسْأَلَهُ حَتَّى أَعْلَمَ فَدَخَلْتُ عَلَى الرِّضَا (عَلَيْهِ السَّلام) فَأَخْبَرْتُهُ قَالَ فَقَالَ لِي الامَامُ ابْنِي ثُمَّ قَالَ هَلْ يَتَجَرَّأُ أَحَدٌ أَنْ يَقُولَ ابْنِي وَلَيْسَ لَهُ وَلَدٌ.

Arabic source transcription, not a back-translation. Text nodes are preserved without spelling or diacritic changes. Printed-edition comparison is pending.

ENGLISH TRANSLATION

5. One of our people has narrated from Muhammad ibn Ali from Mu‘awiya ibn Hakim from ibn abu Basir who has said the following. “Al-Najashi once asked me, “Who will be the Imam after your master? I wish you ask him so I will know.” I then went to see Ali al-Rida عليه السلام and informed him (of al-Najashi’s wish).” The narrator has said that the Imam said, “The Imam will be my son.” Then he said, “Can any one say that my son will be the Imam when he has no son?”

Source & scholarly assessments

Al-Kafi, vol. 1, book 4, chapter 73, report 5

Open original digital source ↗

Allamah Baqir al-Majlisi · مجهول · Mirʾāt al-ʿUqūl fī Sharḥ Akhbār Āl al-Rasūl (3/374)

Shaykh Baqir al-Behbudi · لم يخرجه · Ṣaḥīḥ al-Kāfī

Digital-source transcription only. The recorded assessment is attributed to the named scholar; it does not establish absolute historical certainty.

Arabic witness SHA-256: 1032cbb431592ddcb10cf6e5cf46018991f8749eacda6758a68bccc1ce6a3ccd

Source: Thaqalayn (Stichting Thaqalayn), https://thaqalayn.com/hadith/1/4/73/5. Al-Kafi by al-Kulayni. English translation attributed by the digital catalogue to Muhammad Sarwar. CC BY 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. No endorsement implied.