And his father, Abū Aḥmad, was one of the disciples of Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā al-Dhuhlī. He transmitted the work Skins of Predatory Animals in five fascicles—Imām Muslim compiled it on his authority—and it is an exceedingly precious book. Abū Aḥmad died in 315 AH. The whole family was a household of learning, narration, memorization, and deep understanding.

Abū ʿAlī was born in 298 AH. He heard ḥadiths from his grandfather Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-Māsarjisī (1); from the Imām of the Imāms, Abū Bakr ibn Khuzaymah; Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Sarrāj; Abū Ḥāmid ibn al-Sharqī; and from his own father, Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad.

In 321 AH he set out on his scholarly travels, studying with Abū Bakr ibn Ziyād of Nishapur, the two sons of al-Maḥāmelī, and many other scholars in Iraq. In Syria he met the last remaining students of Hishām ibn ʿAmmār, and in Egypt the students of Yūnus ibn ʿAbd al-Aʿlā and al-Muzanī. He copied both elevated and more common isnāds (2), stayed a long time in Egypt, and there recorded both jurisprudence and ḥadith. He produced a substantial mustakhraj on the two Ṣaḥīḥs, and compiled the Great Musnad, a collection amounting to roughly the load of a camel (3).

Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥākim said in his History: “He compiled the Great Musnad in one thousand three hundred fascicles—that is, in an edited and critically analysed form. He gathered the traditions of al-Zuhrī in a way no-one had achieved before him; he knew them as readily as water flows. He authored works on the military campaigns, on the tribes, on his shaykhs, and on thematic chapters. He produced companion volumes to Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī and to Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim. Death overtook him before anyone had cause to seek his isnād, and with his passing a great deal of knowledge was buried.”

I heard him say: “I heard my father say: ‘I heard Muslim ibn al-Ḥajjāj…’”