He narrated from Abū ʿAmr al-Marshānī, Abū al-Futūḥ al-Jurjānī, and Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Khawlānī.
His teachers numbered two hundred and sixty shaykhs (2).
Along with his mastery of hadith, he was a consulted Mālikī jurist, and the masses relied heavily upon him (3).
Among those who transmitted from him were Shurayḥ ibn Muḥammad and Abū Muḥammad ibn Yarbūʿ.
He died in Seville in the month of Shawwāl, 478 AH (4).
252 – Ibn al-Walīd Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Karkhī *
The chief and most accomplished figure of the Muʿtazila, Abū ʿAlī Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad ibn al-Walīd al-Karkhī, the dialectician.
He was born in 396 AH.
He mastered Muʿtazilite theology under Abū al-Ḥusayn al-Baṣrī (5) and retained from him a hadith whose chain is weak because of Hilāl al-Raʾy (6).
(1) Al-Sila records the name as ‘Abu ‘Umar’; a marginal note adds that another manuscript reads ‘Abu ‘Amr’.
(2) Al-Sila states: “Two hundred and sixty-five men and two women in al-Andalus.”
(3) Al-Sila, vol. 1, p. 284.
(4) Hadiyat al-Arifin, vol. 1, p. 453, gives the year 497 AH for his death, which is erroneous.
(*) Principal biographical sources: al-Muntazam 9/20–22; al-Kamil 10/145–146; al-Ibar 3/291–292; al-Mughni fi al-duafa 2/548; Mizan al-i‘tital 3/464; al-Wafi 2/84–86; al-Bidaya wa-l-nihaya 12/129; Lisan al-mizan 5/56–57; al-Nujum al-zahira 5/121; Shadharat al-dhahab 3/362.
(5) His biography has already been given in volume 17, entry 393.
(6) The report appears in Tarikh al-Khatib 3/100, on the authority of Abu Masud al-Badri: “Among what people have preserved from the prophetic words of old is: If you feel no shame, then do as you wish.” Its chain contains three weak transmitters: the present biographee, his shaykh Abu al-Husayn, and that shaykh’s teacher Hilal al-Raʾy. However, the text itself is sound through other routes found in al-Bukhari (6120), Abu Dawud (4797), and Ibn Majah (183). See also al-Muntazam 9/20–21; al-Bidaya 12/129; al-Wafi bi-l-wafayat 2/48.