Abū ʿAlī al-Ṣadafī said: “Abū Bakr was loved by everyone; he was virtuous and well-spoken of. I have never seen anyone like him who pursued his path. No one came to him seeking to borrow a book except that he either lent it to him or directed him to it.” ⦗1⦘

I heard the Imām Abū’l-Wafāʾ Ibn ʿAqīl al-Ḥanbalī say—he mentioned the severe affliction that had befallen him through a claim levelled against him, and how during that time he would seclude himself to call upon his Lord and converse with Him. He then recited to me one of his private supplications in which he said: “And if You were to say to me, O Lord, ‘Did you ever befriend, for My sake, one of My friends?’ I would answer, ‘Yes, O Lord—Abū Bakr ibn al-Khaḍibah.’ And if You were to say, ‘Did you ever show enmity, for My sake, to an enemy?’ I would answer, ‘Yes, O Lord,’” but he did not name the person. When I informed Ibn al-Khaḍibah of what he had said, he replied, “The shaykh was taken in.” ⦗2⦘

Abū Saʿd al-Samʿānī said: “Ibn al-Khaḍibah copied Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim for pay seven times.”

Muḥammad ibn Ṭāhir said: “In his day there was no one on earth whose reading of hadith was more beautiful than that of Ibn al-Khaḍibah. Were a person to listen to him for two days straight, he would never grow weary.” ⦗3⦘

Al-Silafī said: “I asked Abū’l-Karam Khamīs al-Ḥawzī about Ibn al-Khaḍibah, and he replied: ‘He was a polymath of literature, a model in hadith, eloquent of tongue, a compendium of every good trait. Among the natives of Baghdad I have seen no one whose recitation of hadith was finer, nor anyone more aware of what he was reciting.’” ⦗4⦘

Ibn al-Najjar said: “Ibn al-Khaḍibah was scrupulous and God-fearing, ascetic, reliable, and beloved…"