He also said, concerning the mother of all vices ⦗1⦘:
It almost took wing—and we with it in joyous flight—
were it not for the meshes woven out of its bubbling beads.
He died in Sinjār in 622 AH, a little over eighty years old—may Allah pardon him ⦗2⦘.
181 – Ibn al-Ustād ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Asadī *
The shaykh, imām, hadith scholar and ascetic, Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUlwān ibn ʿAbd Allāh, known as Ibn al-Ustād al-Asadī, from Aleppo.
He was born in 534 AH ⦗3⦘.
In his home city he heard hadith from: Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad al-Ashīrī, Abū Bakr ibn Yāsir al-Jayyānī, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad al-Nūqānī, Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥīm al-Gharnāṭī, Abū Ṭālib Ibn al-ʿAjamī, and Muḥammad ibn Baraka al-Ṣilḥī.
He travelled on and, in Baghdad, studied under Abū Jaʿfar Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-ʿAbbāsī—the senior teacher he ever met. In Damascus he heard from Abū al-Makārim ibn Hilāl, Abū al-Qāsim Ibn ʿAsākir, and Abū al-Mawāhib Ibn Ṣaṣrā.
Many scholars in Egypt, Isfahān, and Khurāsān granted him authorisations. He possessed keen insight, extensive knowledge, and great care for hadith. He was devout and upright, and well-versed in Shāfiʿī jurisprudence.
He had his sons read to him: the Chief Judge Zayn al-Dīn, and the judge—