He answered, “I was listening.” Al-Dāraqutnī remarked, “So I never went back to him.”
I add: Such are the ḥadith shaykhs of today—if they are not nodding off, they are chattering; and when reproached they retort, “We used to listen!” This is nothing but stubborn denial.
Ibn Ḥayyūyah died in Rajab of the year 366 AH.
- Al-Sarrāj, Abū al-Ḥasan Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan b. Aḥmad
The imam, hadith expert, exemplar, and Shaykh al-Islām: Abū al-Ḥasan Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan b. Aḥmad b. Ismāʿīl al-Naysābūrī, the Qur’an reciter.
He journeyed in quest of knowledge and heard from Abū Shuʿayb al-Ḥarrānī, al-Ḥasan b. al-Muthannā al-ʿAnbarī, Mūsā b. Hārūn, Muḥammad b. ʿAbd Allāh Muṭayyīn, Yūsuf al-Qāḍī, and others of that tier.
Among those who transmitted from him were al-Ḥākim, Abū Saʿd al-Mālīnī, Abū al-Ḥusayn b. al-ʿĀlī, Abū Bakr Muḥammad b. Ibrāhīm al-Fārisī al-Mashshāṭ, Muḥammad b. al-Qāsim al-Māwardī al-Qulūsī, Abū Bakr Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Jūrī, and many others besides.
Al-Ḥākim said, “I have seldom seen anyone more diligent in striving and worship than he. He used to teach the Qur’an, and I can liken his state only to that of Abū Yūnus (1), the strong ascetic who prayed until…"