ʿAmr ibn Dīnār transmitted—from Abū Jaʿfar—who said: “Anas ibn Mālik had baras (severe vitiligo), and I saw him eating, putting very large morsels into his mouth.” (1)
Ḥumayd reported on the authority of Anas that he said, “People claim that love for ʿAlī and ʿUthmān cannot dwell together in one heart, yet Allah has placed love for both of them within our hearts.” (2)
Yahyā ibn Saʿīd al-Anṣārī related—from his mother—that she saw Anas scented with khulūq (a saffron perfume) while he still bore traces of vitiligo. She heard me say to his household, “Because of this he is sturdier than Sahl ibn Saʿd, even though he is older than Sahl.” Thereupon he remarked, “The Messenger of Allah—peace and blessings be upon him—prayed for me.” (3)
Abū al-Yaqẓān said, “During the Plague of al-Jārif (4) eighty of Anas’s sons died—some say seventy.”
Muʿādh ibn Muʿādh narrated—ʿImrān told us, from Ayyūb—that when Anas became too weak to fast, he prepared a jafna of tharīd (broth-soaked bread), invited thirty needy people, and fed them. (5)
I say: It is firmly established that Anas was born ten years before the Hijrah.
(1) Ibn Asakir, vol. 3, p. 88a.
(2) The author also records this report in his History, vol. 3, pp. 342–343.
(3) Ibn Asakir, vol. 3, p. 88b.
(4) The plague called al-Jarf struck Basra in 69 AH/688-89 CE. Al-Madaʾini relates, on the authority of an eyewitness, that it lasted three days and took about 200,000 lives. Another source states that during this plague Anas lost seventy of his children and grandchildren; see Duwal al-Islam, 1/52.
(5) Ibn Asakir, vol. 3, p. 88b. Al-Bukhari, 8/135, reports that in his old age Anas ibn Malik fed one poor person each day with bread and meat and himself broke the fast. Al-Hafiz adds: ʿAbd Humaid, through the chain of al-Nadr ibn Anas from Anas, narrates that Anas broke the Ramadan fast when he had grown old and, for each day, fed a needy person instead. We also read in the Fawaʾid of Muhammad ibn Hisham ibn Millas, transmitted from Marwan, from Muʿawiya, from Humayd, that Anas became unable to fast in the year he died. I asked his son ʿUmar ibn Anas, “Could he have made up the fast later?” He replied, “No.” Realizing that he would never regain the strength to fast, Anas ordered large platters of bread and meat to be prepared and fed the prescribed number of poor people—or even more.