Majma al-Zawaid — Hadith 12435

Sayyiduna Awf bin Malik al-Ashja'i (may Allah be pleased with him) narrates: The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "O Awf! What will be your state when this Ummah divides into seventy-three sects, one of which will go to Paradise and all the rest will go to Hell?" I submitted: O Messenger of Allah! When will that happen? The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: When the police (shurat) become many, slave women become owners, people of no standing sit on the pulpits, the Qur'an is made into music, the mosques are adorned, the pulpits are built high, the spoils are treated as personal wealth, zakah is regarded as a penalty, trusts are regarded as spoils, knowledge of the religion is acquired for other than the pleasure of Allah Almighty, a man obeys his wife, disobeys his mother and drives his father away, the latter part of this Ummah curses the earlier ones, the chief of every tribe is its sinful person, the leader of the people is the most contemptible of them, and a man is honoured to avoid his evil. At that time this will happen, and people in distress will go to Syria, and to a city of Syria called Damascus, which will be the best city of Syria; it will protect people from their enemy. I asked: Will Syria be conquered? The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: Yes. That will happen soon. Then after its conquest tribulations will occur; then a dusty, dark tribulation will come; then tribulations will come one after another; then a man from my household will come forth who will be called the Mahdi. If you live to see his time, follow him and be among those who follow the Mahdi. (Allamah al-Haythami says:) I say: Ibn Majah recorded the opening part of this report.
Al-Tabarani recorded it, and its chain contains Abd al-Hamid bin Ibrahim, whom Ibn Hibban declared thiqah (trustworthy), but he is da'if (weak). It contains a group of narrators whom I do not know.