The supreme naqib, “al-Kāmil,” Abū al-Fawāris ibn Abī al-Ḥasan al-Qurashī, al-Hāshimī, al-ʿAbbāsī, al-Zaynabī, from Baghdad.

He was born in the year 398 AH.

He received ḥadith from Abū Naṣr ibn Ḥasnūn al-Narsī, Abū al-Ḥasan ibn Rizqawayh, Hilāl al-Ḥaffār, Abū al-Ḥusayn ibn Bishrān, al-Ḥusayn ibn Burhān, Abū al-Faraj ibn al-Muslima, Abū al-Ḥasan ibn al-Ḥammāmī, and a number of others.

He dictated several sessions, from which the well-known collection al-ʿAwālī and Faḍāʾil al-Ṣaḥāba (The Merits of the Companions) were drawn.

Among those who narrated from him were his two sons—ʿAlī the vizier and Muḥammad—together with Ibn Nāṣir, ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥarbī, Aḥmad ibn al-Muqarrab, Yaḥyā ibn Thābit, Shuhda the scribe, Kamāl daughter of Abū Muḥammad ibn al-Samarqandī and her uncle Ismāʿīl, Hibat Allāh ibn Ṭāwūs, Tajannī al-Wahbāniyya, Abū al-Kirām al-Shahrzūrī, ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAlī al-Ṭāmadhī (1) al-Iṣfahānī, and many others; the last of them to die was the preacher of Mosul, Abū al-Faḍl al-Ṭūsī.

Al-Samʿānī said: “He outstripped his contemporaries in rank, prominence, excellence, sound judgment, and courage. He was appointed naqīb of Basra and then of Baghdad. His hearing, sight, and physical vigor remained unimpaired. He drafted correspondence for the Dīwān, taught in Iṣfahān, and all the scholars of the city flocked to his dictation sessions. No gatherings like his were seen in Baghdad after al-Qaṭīʿī (2). He also dictated in Mecca in 489 AH.”