He said: “Among the books I have composed are: Kitāb al-Iktifā fī Maghāzī Rasūl Allāh ﷺ wa al-Thalāthah al-Khulafāʾ; the Book of the Companions, which, once completed, will be twice the size of Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr’s work; al-Miṣbāḥ, fashioned after al-Shihāb; Sīrat al-Bukhārī in four parts; Ḥilyat al-Amālī fī al-Muwāfaqāt al-ʿAwālī in four parts; al-Abdāl in four parts; a Mashyakhah that I produced for my teacher Ibn Ḥubaysh in three parts; al-Musalsalāt, one part; a number of shorter treatises; and approximately eighty sermons.”

The ḥadīth master Ibn Masdī said: “I have never met anyone his equal in majesty and nobility, leadership and excellence. He was a distinguished imām in many disciplines, both transmitted and rational, in prose and poetry alike, bringing together every virtue. He excelled in the sciences of the Qur’an and in tajwīd.”

“As for literature, he was its native son and unrivalled champion. He was the last of the ḥuffāẓ. He was nominated to head the Dīwān al-Inshāʾ, but he asked to be excused. He learned the Qur’anic readings from the students of Ibn Hudhayl, travelled in pursuit of knowledge, and enjoyed a special relationship with the ḥadīth master Abū al-Qāsim Ibn Ḥubaysh in Murcia; I transmitted extensively from him.”

Al-Kalāʿī, in the licence he gave to the judge al-Ashraf and his family, wrote: “I read the entire Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī to Ibn Ḥubaysh, from his audition of it with Yūnus ibn Mughīth in the year 503 AH. He said: ‘I heard it in 465 AH, when al-Ghassānī read it to Abū ʿUmar Ibn al-Ḥaddāʾ. ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad ibn Asad al-Juhanī, the trustworthy cloth-merchant, narrated it to us in 395 AH; Abū ʿAlī Ibn al-Sakan in Egypt informed us in 343 AH, from al-Farbari, from him.’ ”

“I also read al-Nasāʾī’s Muṣannaf to Ibn Ḥubaysh, and he had heard it from Ibn Mughīth. He said: ‘I read it to Mawlā al-Tallāʿ,’ who said: ‘I heard it from Yūnus ibn ʿAbd Allāh,’ who said: ‘I read it to Ibn al-Aḥmar, from him.’ ” (1)