and al-Ḥasan?
It was said to Nuʿaym, “Why?”
He answered, “Because he was young.”
I say: That point is debatable; in fact, he was already of mature age.
Another report likewise comes from Nuʿaym ibn Ḥammād, on the authority of Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah, who said, “Hishām was the most knowledgeable of all people regarding al-Ḥasan’s hadith.” This is the sounder judgment.
Saʿīd ibn ʿĀmir al-Ḍubʿī relates that he heard Hishām say, “I lived next door to al-Ḥasan for ten years.”
Abū Bakr ibn Abī Shaybah transmitted from Ibn ʿUlayyah, who said, “As far as al-Ḥasan was concerned, we did not regard Hishām ibn Ḥassān as anything of note.”
Makhlad ibn al-Ḥusayn reports from Hishām that whenever he narrated from Ibn Sīrīn he would recite the report in one continuous flow exactly as he had heard it. If Ibn Sīrīn had transmitted it as a mursal report, he would likewise relate it mursal—but only in the material he quoted from Ibn Sīrīn.
ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Abī Rizmah narrates from Ibrāhīm ibn al-Mughīrah al-Marwazī: “I said to Hishām ibn Ḥassān, ‘Show me some of your notebooks.’ He replied, ‘I have no books.’” That is, he relied on memorization and rarely wrote anything down.
Makhlad ibn al-Ḥusayn also narrated from Hishām ibn Ḥassān: “I never wrote down a single hadith from al-Ḥasan or Muḥammad except the hadith of al-Aʿmāq; because it was lengthy, I committed it to writing, and once I had memorized it I erased it.” (1)
ʿAlī said: I heard Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd say, “Hishām ibn Ḥassān narrated from Abū Mujliz….”