Hadith 14: Imam Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥasan ibn Fūrak – may Allah have mercy on him – informed us:ʿAbd Allāh ibn Jaʿfar informed us: Yūnus ibn Ḥabīb narrated to us: Abū Dāwūd al-Ṭayālisī narrated to us: Shuʿba narrated to us on the authority of ʿAṭāʾ ibn al-Sāʾib, on the authority of Abī ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī, on the authority of Abī ʾl-Dardāʾ who said: I heard the Messenger of Allah – may Allah bless him and grant him peace – say: “The father is the middle door of Paradise. If you wish, preserve the door, and if you wish, squander [it].”
The Shaykh, the teacher, the Imam – may Allah have mercy on him – said: “His saying, ‘the middle door of Paradise’ means the best of its doors. It is said: ‘So-and-so is from the middle (awsaṭ) of his people.’ That is, from their best.”