Al-Samʿānī said: “A distinguished Imām, the Shāfiʿī muftī, steadfast upon the way of the early generations. He kept a small zawiya in the congregational mosque of Isfahān and spent most of his time there.”

ʿAbd Allāh⦗1⦘ al-Jubbāʾī remarked, “I have never seen anyone who wept more than al-Rustumī.”

Al-Jubbāʾī also related: “I heard Muḥammad ibn Sālar say, ‘I heard Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Rustumī say:

“I once stopped to listen to Ibn Māshādhah while he was addressing the people. That night I saw the Lord of Might in a dream. He said to me, ‘O Ḥasan, you stood before an innovator, looked at him, and listened to his words; I shall therefore deprive you of sight in this world.’ I woke up—as you can see.⦗2⦘”’”

Al-Jubbāʾī added, “His eyes were open, yet he could not see with them.”

I say: Among those who transmitted from him was the ḥāfiẓ ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Ruhāwī, who said of him: “He was a jurist, an ascetic, a man of piety and frequent tears. He lived a little over ninety years and died in 560 AH—so he stated.”

He continued, “I was present the day he died. People went out to his grave in throngs. At the graveside our shaykh, the ḥāfiẓ Abū Mūsā, dictated a session on his merits. Most of Isfahān’s jurists were his students—even our own shaykh Abū Mūsā studied law under him. The people of Isfahān would accept no legal opinion except his. Our shaykh Abū Ṭāhir al-Silafī once asked me about the scholars of Isfahān; when I mentioned him, he said, ‘I know him to be a devout jurist.’”