bore the name Saʿid—everyone, that is, except Ibn al-Musayyib himself, for he had not been seen for forty years anywhere but on the path between his house and the mosque. I therefore went out, and there stood Saʿid; I supposed that something urgent had moved him.

I said, “Abu Muhammad, why did you not send for me so that I might come to you?”

He replied, “No. It is more fitting that I come to you. You were a bachelor and have now married, and I disliked that you should spend this night alone. Here is your wife.”

She was standing behind him, almost level with his height. He took her by the hand, pushed her through the doorway, and shut the door. Out of modesty the young woman collapsed. I secured the door, placed the bowl in the lamp’s shadow so she would not see it, then went up to the roof and called out to the neighbours. They came and asked, “What is the matter with you?” I informed them, and they went down to her. Word reached my mother, so she came and said, “May I never face you again if you touch her before I prepare her for three days.”

I waited three days, then consummated the marriage. I found her to be among the most beautiful of people, the best guardian of the Book of Allah, the most knowledgeable of the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, and the most conscious of a husband’s rights.

For a month I did not visit Saʿid ibn al-Musayyib. Then I went to him while he was in his circle of teaching. I greeted him; he returned the greeting but did not speak to me until the session broke up. When no one was left but me, he asked, “How is that person doing?”

I said, “Well, Abu Muhammad—exactly as a friend would hope and an enemy would despise.”

He said, “If anything troubles you, the stick is there.”

I went back home, and he sent me twenty thousand dirhams. (1)

Abu Bakr ibn Abi Dawud said: Ibn Abi Wadaʿah is Kathir ibn al-Muttalib ibn Abi Wadaʿah.

I say: He was a Sahmi, from Mecca. He transmitted from his father al-Muttalib, one of those who accepted Islam at the Conquest. From him narrated his son Jaʿfar ibn Kathir and Ibn Harmalah. This story is uniquely reported by Ahmad ibn ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Wahb, and though he is weak, Muslim has nevertheless cited him.