Wuhayb said, “I heard Ayyub remark, ‘Whenever the righteous are mentioned, I keep myself well apart from them.’

Hammad ibn Zayd related: “Ayyub was a friend of Yazid ibn al-Walid; but when Yazid assumed the caliphate, Ayyub prayed, ‘O Allah, make him forget me.’

He used to say, ‘Let a man fear Allah, and even if he embraces asceticism, let him not make his asceticism a torment for other people.’

Hammad also said, ‘On one occasion he was overcome by tears and remarked, “When an old man grows very old, he dribbles.”(1)’

Maʿmar reported: ‘Ayyub’s shirt hung a little long. When someone pointed this out he replied, “These days notoriety lies in shortening one’s clothes.”’

Salih ibn Abi al-Akhdar said, ‘I asked Ayyub, “Advise me.” He said, “Speak little.”’

Hammad ibn Zayd further commented, ‘Had you seen Ayyub and he had asked you for a sip of water during his worship, you would not have given it to him. His hair was thick, his moustache full; he wore a fine Herati shirt that trailed on the ground, an excellent quilted cap, a first-rate Kurdish mantle, and an Adeni cloak—meaning that nothing in his appearance bore the marks of the ascetics or any affectation.’

Shuʿbah said, ‘Ayyub declared, “I have been mentioned, and I do not like to be mentioned.”’

Hammad ibn Zayd also said, ‘Ayyub had a red mantle which he wore when he entered into ihram, and he had designated it as his shroud. When I walked with him he would take such complicated back-streets that I wondered how he even knew them, all to avoid people lest anyone say, “There goes Ayyub.”’

Shuʿbah added, ‘More than once I went out with Ayyub for some need, but he would not let me walk alongside him; he would slip away here and there so that no one would notice him.’

And in The Traits of the Ascetics by Ibn ʿAqil al-Balkhi it is recorded: ‘Muhammad ibn Ibrahim narrated to us…’