Ibn Wāṣil relates: He left one daughter. King al-Jawād married her, but when her uncle al-Ṣāliḥ came to power he annulled the marriage, for al-Jawād had sworn an oath that her divorce would take effect should he commit a certain act—an act he then carried out. Al-Ṣāliḥ subsequently married her to his own son, al-Manṣūr Muḥammad, and she has remained with him to this day.

Al-Ashraf was favorably disposed toward the ḥadith scholars and the Hanbalis. Ibn Wāṣil says that a disturbance broke out between the Shāfiʿīs and the Hanbalis over matters of creed. Shaykh ʿIzz al-Dīn ibn ʿAbd al-Salām took a hard line against the Hanbalis, and the affair grew tumultuous until ʿIzz al-Dīn—may Allah have mercy on him—wrote to al-Ashraf denouncing them and alleging that al-Nāṣiḥ had helped open the Bāb al-Salāmah gate for the armies of al-Ẓāhir and al-Afḍal when they were besieging al-ʿĀdil. Al-Ashraf replied, “O ʿIzz al-Dīn, the fitnah is dormant; may Allah curse the one who stirs it up. As for Bāb al-Salāmah, it is as the poet said:

A crime incited by the fools of a people—
Yet the punishment fell on one who did not commit it.”

During his illness al-Ashraf repented, poured out supplications, and busied himself with abundant remembrance of Allah and seeking forgiveness.

The author says: He suffered from two separate ailments, one in the upper part of his body and one in the lower. The surgeon, it was reported, extracted pieces of bone from his head, and throughout it all he continued to praise Allah.

When the death pangs came, he said to Ibn Musk, “Bring my trust.” The man produced a woolen waist-wrapper containing some cloth relics of past shaykhs and an old loincloth. Al-Ashraf said, “Let this be on my body; with it I hope to shield myself from the Fire. It was given to me by an Abyssinian man from the abdāl who lived in al-Ruha.” (1)

Ibn Ḥammūyah adds: He had boils on his head and at the outlet of the bowels, and the people grieved deeply for him.

I (the author) say: He used to go to great lengths in venerating the shaykh, the jurist. (2) One day the jurist performed his ablution, and al-Ashraf sprang