The Imām, the erudite scholar, the devoted worshipper, a Companion of the Messenger of Allah—may peace and blessings be upon him—and the son of another Companion: Abū Muḥammad.
Others say his kunya was Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, and it is also reported as Abū Nuṣayr al-Qurashī al-Sahmī.
His mother was Rā’iṭah bint al-Ḥajjāj ibn Munabbih al-Sahmiyyah, and his father was only eleven years older than he, or thereabouts.
According to what has reached us, he accepted Islam before his father.
It is said that his name had first been al-ʿĀṣ, but when he embraced Islam the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—changed it to ʿAbd Allah (1).
He was distinguished by many merits and virtues, occupying a firmly rooted station in knowledge and practice, and he conveyed an ample share of learning from the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him.
The hadiths he transmitted amount to seven hundred (2). The two Ṣaḥīḥs agree on seven of them; al-Bukhārī records eight on his own, and Muslim twenty.
With the Prophet’s permission and express allowance he wrote extensively, after the Prophet had initially disliked that the Companions write from him anything other than the Quran (3); the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—ultimately sanctioned it.
Subsequently, consensus was reached—after an earlier disagreement among the Companions, may Allah be pleased with them—on the permissibility, indeed the desirability, of preserving knowledge in writing.