145 – ʿAbd Allāh ibn Yūsuf ibn Aḥmad ibn Bāmūyah (1) al-Ardastānī
The imam, ḥadith scholar, and devout shaykh of the Sufis, Abū Muḥammad al-Ardastānī—widely known as al-Iṣbahānī—who settled in Nishapur.
He was born in 315 AH.
He performed the pilgrimage and accompanied the Shaykh of the Sacred Precinct, Abū Saʿīd ibn al-Aʿrābī, narrating copiously from him. In Nishapur he also heard ḥadith from Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥusayn al-Qaṭṭān, Abū al-Ḥasan al-Būshanjī (2), Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Aṣamm, Abū Rajāʾ Muḥammad ibn Ḥāmid al-Tamīmī, and several others.
Those who transmitted from him include Abū Bakr al-Bayhaqī, Abū al-Qāsim al-Qushayrī, Abū Bakr ibn Khalaf al-Shīrāzī, Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn Mahdī al-ʿAlawī, Muḥammad ibn ʿUbayd Allāh al-Ṣarrām, Abū al-Qāsim ʿUbayd Allāh ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥaskānī, and many others besides them.
In his later years he lost his sight.
He passed away in Ramaḍān of 409 AH at the age of ninety-four.
Al-Bayhaqī reported a large number of traditions from him.