His ḥadith ranks among the loftiest transmissions preserved by al-Silafī.

Abū Nuʿaym the ḥāfiẓ (1) said:
“He kept company with Abū Bakr ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ibrāhīm ibn Wāḍiḥ and with Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥasan, yet he outstripped them both on their own path in courtesy and chivalry. He joined the outward and inward sciences, and for Allah’s sake the blame of any critic never intimidated him. He would denounce those who merely imitated Sufis, along with other ignoramuses, for the corruption of their doctrines—incarnationism, antinomian permissiveness, anthropomorphism, and the rest of their reprehensible traits. Because he summoned them to the truth they shunned him out of ignorance and obstinacy. In his time he stood unrivalled in the field of transmission …,” and then he mentioned a number of names.

He also said: “He passed away on the Day of Eid al-Fitr in 414 AH.”

Abū Bakr Aḥmad ibn Jaʿfar al-Yazdī (2) related:
“I heard the Imām Abū ʿAbd Allāh ibn Manda, on his return from Khurasan in 371 AH, say—in the presence of Abū Jaʿfar, the son of the judge Abū Aḥmad al-ʿAssāl, and several shaykhs. Ibn al-ʿAssāl asked him about the scholars of the lands he had visited, and he replied:
‘I have travelled East and West and have not seen in the world the like of two men: one is your son, and the other is Abū al-Hasan ibn Māshādhah the jurist. It is my intention to appoint him as my executor and to hand my books over to him, for he is worthy of them’—or words to that effect.”

Through a chain that I read to Isḥāq al-Asadī, from Yūsuf ibn Khalīl, from Abū al-Makārim al-Taymī, from Abū ʿAlī al-Muqriʾ, from Abū Nuʿaym in his work al-Ḥilya, it is reported:
“The pinnacle of verification on the Sufi path was sealed with Abū al-Hasan ʿAlī ibn Māshādhah, for Allah—exalted be He—had bestowed upon him mastery of many sciences, generosity, and chivalry. He was a knower of Allah, a jurist who acted on his knowledge, and of refined conduct he possessed an ample share.” (3)