78 – Abū Mūsā al-Madīnī, Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar ibn Aḥmad ibn ʿUmar
The Imām, erudite scholar, great hadith master, reliable authority, and shaykh of the traditionists: Abū Mūsā Muḥammad ibn Abī Bakr ʿUmar ibn Abī ʿĪsā Aḥmad ibn ʿUmar ibn Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn Abī ʿĪsā al-Madīnī, the Isfahani, a Shāfiʿī, and the author of many works.
Birth: Dhū al-Qaʿda, 501 AH.
His father, the Qur’an reciter Abū Bakr, was born in 465 AH.
His father took great care with his education, first having him attend readings in person and later exposing him to a vast body of reports from the companions of the hadith master Abū Nuʿaym and their peers.
Mūsā compiled for his own use a muʿjam (biographical index) in which he related from more than three hundred shaykhs.
He reported, in person, from Abū Saʿd Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad al-Muṭarriz.
(= 6/237) The narration is reported exclusively through the chain of Umara ibn al-Qaqaʿ, from Abu Zurʿa, from Abu Hurayra: A man came to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and asked, “Messenger of Allah, which charity earns the greatest reward?” He replied, “That you give while you are healthy and tight-fisted, fearing poverty and hoping for wealth. Do not delay until the soul reaches the throat and you say, ‘Give such-and-such to so-and-so and such-and-such to so-and-so,’ for by then it already belongs to them.”
(*) A large number of biographers have treated him, among them: al-Samani, al-Madini section of al-Ansab; Ibn al-Athir, al-Lubab; Ibn al-Dhibithi, Tarikh, fol. 74 (Shahid ʿAli MS); Abu Shama, al-Rawdatayn, 2/68; Ibn Khallikan, Wafayat, 4/286; Ibn Manzur, selection from the supplement to al-Samani, fol. 5; al-Dimyati, al-Mustafad, fol. 11; al-Dhahabi in several works—Tarikh al-Islam, fol. 6 (Paris MS 1582), al-Mughtana, fol. 135, al-Ibar, 4/246, al-Mukhtasar al-Muhtaj ilayh, 1/83, and al-Tadhkira, 4/1334; Ibn al-Wardi, Tarikh, 2/95; al-Safadi, al-Wafi, 4/246; al-Yafiʿi, al-Mirʾat, 3/423; al-Subki, al-Tabaqat, 6/160; al-Isnawi, Tabaqat, 2/439; Ibn Kathir, al-Bidaya, 12/318; al-ʿAyni, ʿAqd al-Juman, 17/fol. 21; Ibn Taghribirdi, al-Nujum, 6/101; and Ibn al-ʿImad, al-Shadharat, 4/373.