He then related to al-Muḥibb a dream he had seen about Ibn Tabarzad; the account is preserved in Ibn al-ʿAdīm’s History.

77 – al-Samʿānī, ʿAbd al-Raḥīm ibn ʿAbd al-Karīm ibn Muḥammad
The shaykh, imam, erudite scholar, muftī, ḥadīth expert, Fakhr al-Dīn, Abū al-Muẓaffar ʿAbd al-Raḥīm, son of the great ḥāfiẓ Abū Saʿd ʿAbd al-Karīm ibn Muḥammad ibn Manṣūr ibn al-Samʿānī al-Marwazī, a Shāfiʿī jurist.

He was born in Dhū al-Qaʿdah of the year 537 AH. His father cared for him wholeheartedly, took him on his journeys, and had him hear an amount of ḥadīth beyond description.

With a lofty chain he heard Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī, Sunan Abī Dāwūd, Jāmiʿ Abī ʿĪsā (al-Tirmidhī), Sunan al-Nasāʾī, the Musnad of Abū ʿAwānah, and the History of al-Fasawī.

He also heard Ḥilyat al-Awliyāʾ, the Musnad of al-Haytham, Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, and a large portion of the Musnad of al-Sarrāj.

His father extracted for him narrations of elevated isnād in two volumes, kept him occupied with fiqh, ḥadīth, and literature, and enabled him to acquire a share of every discipline. The leadership of the Shāfiʿī school in his homeland ultimately came to rest with him, and he enjoyed great honor and respect, as Ibn al-Najjār observes.

Ibn al-Najjār further states that his father compiled for him a biographical Muʿjam in eighteen fascicles.

I (the author) add: His highest-ranking shaykh was Abū Tammām Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Mukhtār al-ʿAbbāsī, the merchant, who narrated to him “The Description of the Hypocrite” in Nīshāpūr, from Abū Jaʿfar ibn al-Muslima.