40 – Ibn al-Rūmiyya, Abū al-ʿAbbās Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn Mufarrij al-Ishbīlī *
The shaykh, imam, jurist, ḥadith master, critic, and physician: Abū al-ʿAbbās Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn Mufarrij al-Ishbīlī, an Umayyad client, al-Ḥazmī, al-Ẓāhirī, al-Nabātī, al-Zuhri, the herbalist.
He was born in 561 AH.
He heard hadith from Abū ʿAbd Allah ibn Zarqūn, Abū Bakr ibn al-Jadd, Abū Muḥammad Aḥmad ibn Jumhūr, Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī al-Tujībī, Abū Dharr al-Khushanī, and a number of others.
On his travels he studied with the pupils of al-Farāwī and with Abū al-Waqt al-Sijzī.
Abū ʿAbd Allah al-Abbār (1) said: “He was a Ẓāhirī, fiercely devoted to Ibn Ḥazm after previously following the Mālikī school.
“He was also well-versed in hadith and its transmitters, and authored a useful volume that supplements Ibn ʿAdī’s al-Kāmil. His expertise in botany and medicinal herbs surpassed that of the scholars of his age, and he even kept a stall where he sold them. The majority of our companions received hadith from him.”
(*) Supplement to the Obituaries of the Transmitters, vol. 3, entry 2928; Ibn al-Abbar, Continuation of al-Sila, 1/121–122, entry 304; Ibn Abi Usaybia, Uyoon al-Anba, 2/81; Ibn Saʿid al-Andalusi, Abridgement of al-Qadhu al-Muʿalla, p. 181; Ibn al-ʿAdim, Bughyat al-Talab, ms. 2, fol. 4; al-Dhahabi, Tadhkirat al-Huffaz, 4/1425–1426, entry 1138; al-Mushtabih, p. 339; Tarikh al-Islam (Aya Sofya 3012), fol. 186; al-Safadi, al-Wafi bi’l-Wafayat, 8/45, entry 3451; Ibn al-Khatib, al-Ihata fi Akhbar Gharnata, 1/88; Ibn Farhun, al-Dibaj al-Mudhahhab (Dar al-Turath), 1/191–193, entry 69; Ibn Nasir al-Din, al-Tawdih li-Kitab al-Mushtabih fi’l-Rijal, fol. 115; Tabsir al-Muntabih bi-Tahrir al-Mushtabih, p. 662, which erroneously calls him Ahmad b. Ahmad b. Muhammad b. Mufarrij; al-Maqqari, Nafh al-Tib, 1/634; al-Suyuti, Tabaqat al-Huffaz, p. 498, entry 1106; Ibn al-ʿImad, Shadharat al-Dhahab, 5/184; Taj al-ʿArus (s.v. zahr), 3/250; al-Qanawji, al-Taj al-Mukallal, pp. 322–323; al-Risala al-Mustatrafah, p. 145.
(1) Continuation of al-Sila, 1/121–122.