ʿAbd al-Ghāfir mentions him in his Sīyāq (1) and says: “He is Zayn al-Islām, Abū Naṣr ʿAbd al-Raḥīm—the imam of the imams, the scholar of the ummah, an ocean of knowledge, the foremost man of his age. In character and appearance he so resembled his father that it was as though he had been cut from the same cloth. He achieved perfection in both poetry (2) and prose, outstripping all competitors in the twin arts. He then kept close company with Imām al-Ḥaramayn, mastering the school, its foundations, and its disputations, clinging to him and modeling himself on him. Afterwards he set out on pilgrimage, and the people of Baghdad witnessed his excellence and completeness; he enjoyed an acceptance unprecedented for anyone before him. The notables attended his sessions and unanimously agreed that they had never seen his equal in the breadth of his learning … until [ʿAbd al-Ghāfir] went on to say:

‘The partisanship shown on his behalf reached a level that nearly led to civil strife (3).’

Abū ʿAmr Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ (4) said: Our shaykh, Abū Bakr al-Qāsim ibn al-Ṣaffār, stated, ‘My father, Abū Saʿd, was born in 508 AH; he heard ḥadith from his grandfather when he was four years old—or a little older. Remarkably, he wrote out the ṭabaqah in his own hand and lived on until the year 600 AH.’

Abū Naṣr died on the 28th of Jumādā al-Ākhirah, 514 AH, when he was in his eighties.”}