—namely, the seven canonical readings. The shaykh agreed, and al-Dhahabī began the recitation: he read al-Fātiḥa and some verses from Sūrat al-Baqarah while the shaykh pointed out the variant differences, dismissing the transmission of Yaʿqūb and others. When al-Dhahabī mentioned that he wished to confine himself to the seven readings only, the shaykh assumed this signified a lack of knowledge and directed him to one of his own pupils. Al-Dhahabī remarks, "What made me lose interest in him was that I could gain admission to him only with difficulty—I would be turned away and then granted permission once—and, moreover, I could not recite even a quarter of a ḥizb in one combined sitting before my voice failed, because of his deafness." Fearing that his short time would be wasted, al-Dhahabī left him (1) and went to the Qurʾān master Ṣadr al-Dīn Abū al-Qāsim ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm ibn ʿImrān al-Dukkālī, better known as Sahnūn (610–695 AH) (2), who had become weak and blind. With him al-Dhahabī completed the entire Qurʾān in the two readings of Warsh and Ḥafṣ within eleven days, together with a group of his companions (3).

In Alexandria he also studied with a number of its distinguished scholars (4), foremost among them Tāj al-Dīn Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī ibn Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd al-Muḥsin al-Hāshimī al-Ḥusaynī al-Wāsiṭī al-Gharāfī, later al-Iskandarānī (628–704 AH), the shaykh of Dār al-Ḥadīth al-Nabīhiyya in Alexandria (5). He likewise traveled to Bilbays and received instruction there (6).

This journey was short, but al-Dhahabī pushed himself to read as much as possible to the shaykhs of those regions; he relates, for example, that he completed the entire Sīra of Ibn Hishām with his teacher Abū al-Maʿālī al-Abrāqūhī in only a few days (7).