Sunan Ibn Majah
Sunan Ibn Majah 2258
حَدَّثَنَا أَحْمَدُ بْنُ عَبْدَةَ، أَنْبَأَنَا حَمَّادُ بْنُ زَيْدٍ، عَنْ سُلَيْمَانَ بْنِ عَلِيٍّ الرِّبْعِيِّ، عَنْ أَبِي الْجَوْزَاءِ، قَالَ سَمِعْتُهُ يَأْمُرُ، بِالصَّرْفِ - يَعْنِي ابْنَ عَبَّاسٍ - وَيُحَدَّثُ ذَلِكَ عَنْهُ ثُمَّ بَلَغَنِي أَنَّهُ رَجَعَ عَنْ ذَلِكَ فَلَقِيتُهُ بِمَكَّةَ فَقُلْتُ إِنَّهُ بَلَغَنِي أَنَّكَ رَجَعْتَ . قَالَ نَعَمْ إِنَّمَا كَانَ ذَلِكَ رَأْيًا مِنِّي وَهَذَا أَبُو سَعِيدٍ يُحَدِّثُ عَنْ رَسُولِ اللَّهِ ـ صلى الله عليه وسلم ـ أَنَّهُ نَهَى عَنِ الصَّرْفِ .
Unreviewed translation. All hadiths in this collection are available in five languages. Titles and introductions may remain in Arabic.
Abu al-Jawzaʾ said: I heard him—I mean Ibn ʿAbbas—command currency exchange, and that was related from him. Then it reached me that he had retracted that position, so I met him in Mecca and said, ‘I have heard that you retracted it.’ He said, ‘Yes. That had only been my own opinion, whereas Abu Saʿid reports from the Messenger of Allah that he forbade currency exchange.’
Notes and open questions — unreviewed
The pronoun in ‘I heard him’ is identified by the source’s parenthetical gloss as Ibn ʿAbbas. The word ṣarf is rendered ‘currency exchange’ in context.
بِالصَّرْفِ - يَعْنِي ابْنَ عَبَّاسٍ - وَيُحَدَّثُ ذَلِكَ عَنْهُ ثُمَّ بَلَغَنِي أَنَّهُ رَجَعَ عَنْ ذَلِكَ فَلَقِيتُهُ بِمَكَّةَ فَقُلْتُ إِنَّهُ بَلَغَنِي أَنَّكَ رَجَعْتَ .
The sentence says that the command to engage in ṣarf ‘was related from him’; the precise scope of this indirect report is not elaborated.
Does the wording refer simply to a position attributed to Ibn ʿAbbas, as translated here?