Salamah ibn Shabib reported: ʿAbd al-Razzaq narrated to us: I heard Ibn al-Mubarak say, “I still write down a hadith from Maʿmar even though I have already heard it from someone else.” He was asked, “What makes you do that?” He replied, “Have you not heard the rajiz poet say:
‘We have come to know your good from your evil…’”

ʿAbd al-Razzaq also said: Malik once told me, “Maʿmar was an excellent man—were it not for his transmitting tafsir from Qatadah.”

I (the author) remark: Imam Malik’s attitude toward tafsir seems one of reserve, because its chains of transmission are usually broken; hence he rarely narrated any of it. Nevertheless, a small and valuable portion of Qurʾanic commentary transmitted from Malik has reached us.

ʿAli said: I heard ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Mahdi say, “There are two narrators whose reports, if written down wholesale, I find …, but when I select from them, they are fine: Maʿmar and Hammad ibn Salamah.”

Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Muqaddami related from his father: I heard ʿAli ibn al-Madini say, “Chains of transmission were gathered for Maʿmar that none of his peers possessed: Ayyub and Qatadah in Basra; Abu Ishaq and al-Aʿmash in Kufa; al-Zuhri and ʿAmr ibn Dinar in the Hijaz; and Yahya ibn Abi Kathir.”

Al-Ramadi narrated: ʿAbd al-Razzaq informed us; Maʿmar told us: “I recounted some hadiths to Yahya ibn Abi Kathir, and he said, ‘Write down such-and-such a hadith.’ I said, ‘Abu Nasr, do you not dislike having knowledge written down?’ He replied, ‘Write it for me; if you have not already written it, you have squandered— or he said: failed.’”

Muhammad ibn ʿAwf al-Himsi said: Muhammad ibn Rajaʾ related to us; ʿAbd al-Razzaq informed us: I heard Ibn Jurayj say, “Keep to this man—meaning Maʿmar—for in his time no one more knowledgeable than he remained.”