To what extent is the hadith sound: "What Allah has declared lawful in His Book is lawful, and what He has declared unlawful is unlawful, and what He has remained silent about is a dispensation, so accept the dispensation from Allah, for Allah is not forgetful." Then he recited this verse: "And your Lord is never forgetful" (Maryam: 64)? Is it permissible to use it as an argument, and what should we do with hadiths regarding which the sayings of the scholars have differed?

The answer is summarized as follows: The aforementioned hadith was narrated with similar wordings by several Companions, such as Abu Darda, Salman al-Farisi, and Abu Tha'labah al-Khushani. Most scholars have judged the chains of transmission (isnad) of these narrations to be weak (da'if) or interrupted (munqati'), which makes them unsuitable for independent argumentation.

However, some scholars, such as Al-Nawawi and Ibn al-Qayyim, deemed this hadith "hasan" (good) due to its multiple routes and corroborating evidence, and considered its meaning to be sound and established in the fundamentals of religion, like Ibn al-Arabi and Al-Sam'ani.

While others believed that the severe weakness in some routes prevents their strengthening by their aggregate. The narration from Ibn Abbas was authenticated as a saying attributed to him (mawquf), and its general meaning is agreed upon by scholars.

It should be noted that scholars' judgments regarding authenticity or weakness may differ based on the specific routes they evaluate, and this is not considered a contradiction. A Muslim should follow what appears to him as the truth after research, or imitate someone whose knowledge and trustworthiness he trusts.