al-Samʿānī said, “His handwriting was poor, and—so far as I heard—his knowledge of hadith was not great. I heard Muḥammad ibn Abī Ṭāhir in Isfahān relate that he had heard Abū Jaʿfar ibn Abī ʿAlī say:

‘A shaykh in Jurjān proved hard to approach, so I swore that I would not leave the city until I had written down everything he possessed. I remained there for a while, and he kept bringing out to me the single-fascicle booklets (ajzāʾ) and loose sheets (riqāʿ) until I had copied everything I could find.’

I say: Those who narrated from him include Ibn Ṭāhir al-Maqdisī, Abū al-ʿAlāʾ al-ʿAṭṭār, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb ibn al-Muʿazzam, and others.

He is the one who stood up during a preaching session of Imām al-Ḥaramayn and challenged him on the issue of the Divine elevation (ʿuluww). He said, ‘No gnostic has ever said “O Allah” except that, from deep within, the intention to seek the heights arises; he turns neither to the right nor to the left. Is there any stratagem by which this inescapable impulse can be averted?’

Imām al-Ḥaramayn replied, ‘My dear friend, nothing remains but bewilderment…,’ and the story appears in the biography of Abū al-Maʿālī. (1)

Abū Jaʿfar died in mid-Dhu’l-Qaʿdah of the year 531 AH.

62 – al-Jawharī, Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn Ḥasan ibn Asad*

The imam, the ḥāfiẓ, the leader, the dignified notable: Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn Ḥasan ibn Asad al-Barūjirdī.

Barūjird is a locality near Hamadhān.

He copied a great many works, produced fair transcripts, and compiled a personal Muʿjam in a single volume.

He heard hadith from al-Sallār Makkī ibn ʿAllān, Abū Muṭīʿ al-Ṣaḥḥāf, Abū al-Fatḥ Aḥmad ibn al-Sūdhargānī, ʿAlī ibn al-Akhram al-Madīnī, Naṣr Allāh al-Khushnāmī, Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-Khalīlī in Balkh, Abū al-Ḥasan ibn al-ʿAllāf, and others of similar rank.