from his father, who said: “I was with ʿUthmān—may Allah be pleased with him—when he called for water to purify himself and said:
‘I heard the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) say: “Whenever the time for a prescribed prayer arrives, and a Muslim performs its ablution well, together with proper humility and bowing, that prayer becomes an expiation for the sins committed during it—or, he said, before it—so long as he does not perpetrate a major sin. This remains true for all time.”’
Muslim transmitted it (1) through ʿAbd and Ibn al-Shāʿir, from Abū al-Walīd.

Ibn Arslān relates in his History: “I read in the handwriting of the ḥāfiẓ Abū Saʿīd that when Abū al-ʿAbbās was stricken with the illness that led to his death, the Muslims were greatly distressed. His in-law, Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Azharī, saw in a dream that Abū al-ʿAbbās would soon join us, and that whoever sought forgiveness for him would himself be forgiven. The report spread throughout the city, and its inhabitants came to him in crowds, whereupon he would ask Allah to forgive them.

He lay ill for fifteen days, and on the eve of Friday his tongue grew still, save for a whispered repetition of the words, ‘There is no god but Allah.’

He passed away on the night of Saturday, the eleventh of Ṣafar in the year 356 AH.

The calamity was immense; everyone gathered for his funeral, and the formal condolences lasted six days, filled with jurists, dignitaries, and the leading landed gentry (2). Khwārazm-Shāh Abū Saʿīd Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿIrāq attended the condolence with his emirs, and many elegies were composed for him.

He died leaving three sons—may Allah Most High have mercy on him.

136 – Abū Firās al-Ḥārith ibn Saʿīd ibn Ḥamdān al-Taghlibī
The emir, Abū Firās al-Ḥārith ibn Saʿīd ibn Ḥamdān al-Taghlibī, the poet