—a mawla (client) of Ibn Abī ʿAttāb, the Andalusian (1).

Born: in 383 AH.

He transmitted hadith from: ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Aḥmad al-Tujībī; Abū al-Qāsim Khalaf ibn Yaḥyā; Abū al-Muṭarrif al-Qanāziʿī; Saʿīd ibn Salamah; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Nabāt; ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Aḥmad ibn Bishr, the qāḍī; Yūnus ibn Mughīth; Abū Ayyūb ibn ʿUmrūn; the judge Abū Bakr ibn Wāqid; and several others.

Those who narrated from him include his son, Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad, and others.

Khalaf ibn Bashkuwāl (2) said: “He was a faqīh (jurist), god-fearing and active in good works, keenly versed in hadith and its transmission routes. In compiling transmission certificates he was unrivalled: he spent his whole life copying them and never accepted any payment. It is said that he read in this field more than forty works (3).

“He mastered many branches of learning, had memorised historical reports, poetry, and proverbs, and was unbending in upholding the truth. He kept his distance from the authorities and their trappings, was humble, modest in his dress, and attended to his own needs.

“He was the shaykh of the consultative body (ahl al-shūrā) in his day, and the issuance of fatwa revolved around him. He was invited several times to assume the judgeship of Córdoba but declined, holding the responsibility of giving fatwa in great awe and saying, ‘I would be content if I could escape from it altogether.’

“He adopted certain preferred opinions from among the scholars’ views, which he applied in his own personal practice.”

Abū ʿAlī al-Ghassānī said: “He was one of the eminent, reliable scholars, a man who devoted his lifetime to fiqh and the audition of hadith, committing them to writing and perfecting his knowledge of them.”