from 'Ammar, the freed slave of al-Harith ibn Nawfal, that he witnessed the funeral of Umm Kulthum and her son, and the boy was placed closer to the Qiblah. I disapproved of that, and among the people were Ibn Abbas, Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, Abu Qatadah, and Abu Hurayrah, and they said: "This is the Sunnah" (1). The text transmitted from Ahmad, in a narration by a group of his companions, is that the men are closer to the imam, the boys are in front of them, and the women are closer to the Qiblah. This is the school of Abu Hanifah and al-Shafi'i; because they are placed in front of women in the rows of the prescribed prayer, so they are likewise placed in front of them closest to the imam when funerals are gathered, just like men. As for the hadith of 'Ammar (2), the correct view regarding it is that he placed her closer to the Qiblah and placed her son closer to him. This is how Sa'id and 'Ammar, the freed slave of Banu Salamah (3), narrated it from 'Ammar, the freed slave of Banu Hashim. Abu Dawud, al-Nasa'i, and others also reported it as such (4), and its wording is: "I witnessed the funeral of a boy and a woman, and the boy was placed closer to the people, and the woman was placed behind him. Among the people were Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, Ibn Abbas, Abu Qatadah, and Abu Hurayrah. We asked them, and they said: 'It is the Sunnah.'" As for the first hadith, it is not sound, for Zayd ibn 'Umar is the son of Umm Kulthum bint 'Ali, the one who was prayed over along with her, and he was a man who had children. This is what al-Zubayr ibn Bakkar stated. There is no disagreement regarding placing a man before a woman, and [furthermore] because Zayd was struck in a war that took place between the Banu 'Adi (5) during the caliphate (6) of the Banu Umayyah, he collapsed, was carried [away], and died, and two women crying out (7) met over him and his mother; thus, he could only have been a man.