the foremost masters of rational inquiry. He began poring over the hadith collections, performed the pilgrimage and returned, then abandoned the approach on which he had debated for thirty years. He adopted the Shafiʿi school and made this known in the year 468 AH. The people of Marw were unsettled and the common folk bewildered, until letters arrived from the amir in Balkh concerning him, ordering strict measures against him. He therefore left Marw, accompanied by Dhū ʾl-Majdayn Abū al-Qāsim al-Mūsawī and a group of companions, with several jurists in his service.

He travelled to Ṭūs and then set out for Nishapur, where his associates welcomed him with great honour during the days of Niẓām al-Mulk and the court-chancellor Abū Saʿd. They treated him generously, lodged him with dignity and respect, and convened for him a preaching assembly in the Shafiʿi madrasah. He was an ocean in exhortation, a ḥāfiẓ of hadith, and the people readily accepted him; his position within the Shafiʿi school became firmly established. He later returned to Marw, taught there in the Shafiʿi madrasah, and Niẓām al-Mulk advanced him over his peers. His followers gained prominence, and he departed for Isfahan, his reputation still ascending (1).

He authored Kitāb al-Istilām (2), Kitāb al-Burhān (3), and a set of hadith dictations known as the Amālī (4). Zealous for the people of hadith, the sunnah, and the community, he was a thorn in the eyes of the dissenters and a decisive proof for Ahl al-Sunnah.

Abū Saʿd said: “My grandfather composed a tafsīr, and works in jurisprudence and uṣūl…"