Sahih Muslim 540
صحيح مسلم#540Sahihحَدَّثَنَا أَبُو كَامِلٍ الْجَحْدَرِيُّ، حَدَّثَنَا حَمَّادُ بْنُ زَيْدٍ، عَنْ كَثِيرٍ، عَنْ عَطَاءٍ، عَنْ جَابِرٍ، قَالَ كُنَّا مَعَ النَّبِيِّ صلى الله عليه وسلم فَبَعَثَنِي فِي حَاجَةٍ فَرَجَعْتُ وَهُوَ يُصَلِّي عَلَى رَاحِلَتِهِ وَوَجْهُهُ عَلَى غَيْرِ الْقِبْلَةِ فَسَلَّمْتُ عَلَيْهِ فَلَمْ يَرُدَّ عَلَىَّ فَلَمَّا انْصَرَفَ قَالَ " إِنَّهُ لَمْ يَمْنَعْنِي أَنْ أَرُدَّ عَلَيْكَ إِلاَّ أَنِّي كُنْتُ أُصَلِّي " .
Jabir reported:We were in the company of the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ), and he sent me on an errand, and when I came back (I saw him) saying prayer on his ride and his face was not turned towards Qibla. I greeted him but he did not respond to me. As he completed the prayer, he said: Nothing prevented me from responding to your greeting but the fact that I was praying
Scholarly Authentication
The label above is the grade most of these scholars gave, each scholar counted once — one dissenting opinion no longer speaks for all of them. If any scholar calls a narration fabricated, that verdict is shown instead, whatever the others say. When they judged only its chain of narrators (“Isnaad”), the label says “Sound chain”. Each scholar's own wording:
Every narration in Sahih Muslim is accepted as Sahih (authentic) by the established status of the book.
Sahih Muslim 540 is the standard (Abd al-Baqi) number; this narration is #1207 in the MuslimGPT index.
In-book reference: 5:47