[somamasoso]

Narrated Al-Abbas ibn AbdulMuttalib: I was sitting in al-Batha with a company among whom the Apostle of Allah (peace_be_upon_him) was sitting, when a cloud passed above them. The Apostle of Allah (peace_be_upon_him) looked at it and said: What do you call this? They said: Sahab. He said: And muzn? They said: And muzn. He said: And anan? They said: And anan. AbuDawud said: I am not quite confident about the word anan. He asked: Do you know the distance between Heaven and earth? They replied: We do not know. He then said: The distance between them is seventy-one, seventy-two, or seventy-three years. The heaven which is above it is at a similar distance (going on till he counted seven heavens). Above the seventh heaven there is a sea, the distance between whose surface and bottom is like that between one heaven and the next. Above that there are eight mountain goats the distance between whose hoofs and haunches is like the distance between one heaven and the next. Then Allah, the Blessed and the Exalted, is above that. (Book #40, Hadith #4705) Muhammad b. Jubair b. Mut’im said from his father on the authority of his grandfather:
An A’rab(a nomadic Arab) came to the Apostle of Allah(may peace be upon him) and said: People suffering distress, the children are hungry, the crops are withered, and the animals are perished, so ask Allah to grant us rain, for we seek you as our intercessor with Allah, and Allah as intercessor with you. The Apostle of Allah(may peace be upon him) said: Woe to you: Do you know what you are saying? Then the Apostle of Allah(may peace be upon him) declared Allah’s glory and he continued declaring His glory till the effect of that was apparent in the faces of his Companions. He then said: Woe to you: Allah is not to be sought as intercessor with anyone. Allah’s state is greater than that. Woe to you! Do you know how great Allah is? His throne is above the heavens thus(indicating with his fingers like a dome over him), and it groans on account of Him as a saddle does because of the rider.

Ibn Bashshar said in his version: Allah is above the throne, and the throne is above the heavens. He then mentioned the rest of the tradition. ‘Abd al-A’la, Ibn al- Muthana and Ibn Bashshar transmitted it from Ya’qub b. ‘Utbah and Jubair b. Muhammad b. Jubair from his father on the authority of his grandfather.

Abu Dawud said: This tradition with the chain of Ahmad b. Sa’ad is sound. It has been approved by the body (of traditionists) , which includes Yahya b. Ma’in and ‘Ali b. al-Madani, and a group has transmitted it from Ibn Ishaq, as Ahmad also said. And so far as I have been informed ‘Abd al-A’la, Ibn al-Muthanna, and Ibn Bashshar had heard from the same copy(of the collection of tradition). A bit shocked I have to say... do we know if Imam Abu Dawud applied ta'wil to such hadiths?