Al-Samʿānī said: He is the imam Abū Turāb, without equal in his discipline—impressive in appearance, pure in soul, one who acts upon his knowledge, of fine character, of great benefit to people, possessed of a powerful memory, a born jurist. He studied jurisprudence in Baghdad under the judge Abū al-Ṭayyib.

Abū Jaʿfar ibn Abī ʿAlī al-Hamadhānī related: I heard Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad al-Bisṭāmī and others say:

“We were with the imam Abū Turāb when ʿAbd al-Ṣamad entered carrying the royal writ appointing him as judge of Hamadhān. Abū Turāb rose, prayed two cycles, then turned to us and said, ‘I am awaiting the writ from Allah, delivered by His servant the Angel of Death; that suits me better than this writ of judgeship. Sitting in this mosque for an hour with an untroubled heart is dearer to me than the sovereignty of the two Iraqs, and a single question of knowledge from which a student benefits is dearer to me than the deeds of both the jinn and mankind.’” (1)

Al-Samʿānī said: I asked the ḥāfiẓ Ismāʿīl about Abū Turāb al-Marāghī, and he answered:

“He was the mufti of Nīshāpūr and issued legal opinions for many years according to the Shāfiʿī school. He was of good appearance, distinguished, and learned. It is said that he lived 93 years and died on the 14th of Dhu al-Qaʿda in 492 AH.”

Others say that he was born in 401 AH.

94 – Ibn Abī Dharr ʿĪsā ibn ʿAbd ibn Aḥmad al-Anṣārī *

The shaykh, the scholar, the truthful narrator, Abū Maktūm ʿĪsā, son of the great ḥāfiẓ Abū Dharr ʿAbd