- al-Mandāʾī, Abū al-Fatḥ Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn Bakhtiyār*
The shaykh, imām, judge, long-lived scholar, and musnid of Iraq: Abū al-Fatḥ Muḥammad, son of the qāḍī Abū al-ʿAbbās Aḥmad ibn Bakhtiyār ibn ʿAlī ibn Muḥammad al-Mandāʾī, from Wāsiṭ.
He was born in Wāsiṭ in the year seventeen (1).
His father devoted great attention to him and took him on his travels (2). During those journeys he heard hadith in abundance from Abū al-Qāsim ibn al-Ḥusayn, Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Bāriʿ, Hibat Allāh ibn al-Ṭabar, Aḥmad ibn ʿAlī al-Mujallī, the ḥāfiẓ Abū ʿĀmir al-ʿAbdarī, Makkī al-Burūjirdī, ʿUbayd Allāh ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Bayhaqī, Abū Bakr al-Mazrafī, the Qadi of the Bīmāristān, Abū Manṣūr al-Qazzāz, Abū Manṣūr ibn Khayrūn, and many others.
When his father served as judge of Kūfa, he arranged for him to study there with Abū al-Barakāt ʿUmar ibn Ibrāhīm al-Zaydī.
Back in Wāsiṭ he heard from Abū al-Karam Naṣr Allāh ibn al-Jalakht, the qadi Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī al-Jallābī, and al-Mubārak ibn Naghūbā.
He also recited there to Aḥmad ibn ʿUbayd Allāh al-Āmidī and Ibn Tarkān.
He pursued jurisprudence in Baghdad with Abū Manṣūr ibn al-Razzāz and refined his literary training under Abū Manṣūr ibn al-Jawālīqī.