I found, in the handwriting of one of the Shaykh’s companions, the following:

When the Shaykh set out, on the very day he departed from protected Damascus, the occasion was momentous—unparalleled for the sheer press of people who flocked to bid him farewell and to gaze upon him—until they spread out (1) from the gate of his house to the vicinity of al-Jasūra (2), between Damascus and al-Kiswah (3), the first stopping-place on the route. Among them were those weeping, grieving, marveling, strolling about, and others pushing forward in fervent devotion.

[ق 88] The Shaykh entered the city of Gaza on Saturday and held a great session in its congregational mosque.

On Thursday, the twenty-second of Ramadan, the Shaykh and the judge arrived in Cairo.

On the following day, after the Friday prayer, the judges and the leading dignitaries of state were convened in the Citadel for the Shaykh’s assembly (4). The Shaykh wished to speak, but he was not allowed to debate and discourse as was his custom. Al-Shams Ibn ʿAdlān volunteered as an adversary, acting out of religious duty, and charged him before the Maliki judge Ibn Makhluf (5) with asserting that “Allah is truly above the Throne, and that Allah speaks with letters and sound,” and he demanded the Shaykh’s response.