Then a decree from the Sultan arrived ordering his release, and he was accordingly set free on Monday, the Day of ʿĀshūrāʾ, in the year 721 AH. He returned to his home.
***
After that he continued teaching the people, giving lessons from time to time at the Hanbali complex (1), while students also read to him in his own school in the Qaṣṣāʿīn quarter (2) on a variety of disciplines (3). During that period I would visit him occasionally (4); I read to him a portion of al-Rāzī’s “Forty Ḥadīths,” which he explained to me, writing a few remarks on some sections. At the same time his own books were being read aloud to him, and he would revise them, adding or deleting as he deemed appropriate.
I once accompanied him to the garden of the emir Fakhr al-Dīn ibn al-Shams Luʾluʾ (6), who had prepared a banquet there. On that day I read forty ḥadīths to the Shaykh, and some of the group recorded the names of those present. The Shaykh then began to