close together. He would spend the whole night in worship, then stick his head out of his tent and call:
“O ʿAbd al-Raḥmān! O Hishām ibn al-Ghāz! O so-and-so! Standing in prayer at night and fasting by day are easier than drinking pus, wearing iron shackles, and eating zaqqūm. Seek deliverance—seek deliverance!”
Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz said: He died in Jericho and was buried in Jerusalem.
His son ʿUthmān said: My father died in the year 135 AH.
It is also said that he was born in the year 50 AH.
53 – Ayyūb, Abū al-ʿAlāʾ, al-Qaṣṣāb al-Wāsitī * (D, T, S)
He is Ayyūb ibn Miskīn—some say Ibn Abī Miskīn—the jurist and mufti of the people of Wāsiṭ.
He narrated from Qatādah, Saʿīd al-Maqburī, and ʿAbd Allāh ibn Shubruma.
He died in middle age, before his ḥadith became widely circulated.
Among those who transmitted from him are Hushaym, Isḥāq al-Azraq, Yazīd ibn Hārūn, and others.
Abū Ḥātim said: “There is nothing objectionable about him.”
Yazīd dated his death to the year 140 AH.
Had it not been for his early death, he would have belonged to the tier of the two Ḥammāds.
54 – Ḥabīb al-ʿAjamī, Abū Muḥammad al-Baṣrī ** (BKh)
The leading ascetic and devotee of Basra, Abū Muḥammad.
He narrated from al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī, Shahr ibn Ḥawshab, and from al-Farazdaq a few reports.