people; he would dispatch me with them to al-Bārijāh, where I would press them into the mud.

Muhammad ibn Abi Safwan al-Thaqafi said: Umayyah ibn Khalid narrated to us. I asked Shuʿbah, “Why do you not relate from ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Abi Sulayman?” He replied, “I have abandoned his narrations.” I said, “You narrate from Muhammad ibn ʿUbayd Allah al-ʿArzami yet leave him?!” He answered, “Yes.” I said, “But his reports are good.” He responded, “It is precisely because of their ‘goodness’ that I fled from them.” (1)

Al-Qattan reported that Shuʿbah said, “Had ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Abi Sulayman brought a hadith like it, his narration would likewise have been abandoned”—referring to his report from ʿAtaʾ, from Jabir: “The neighbor has the stronger right to the pre-emption of his neighbor’s property; one should wait for him even if he is absent, provided their approach is the same.” (2)

It is narrated from Shuʿbah that he said, “I named my son Saʿd, yet he neither prospered nor succeeded.”

Sahl ibn Salih said: Abu Dawud narrated to us; Shuʿbah narrated: “Sufyan al-Thawri said to me, ‘You are the Commander of the Faithful in hadith.’”

Abu Hatim ibn Hibban said: al-Siraj informed us; I heard al-Darimi; I heard al-Nadr ibn Shumayl say: “Sulayman ibn al-Mughira used to say, ‘Shuʿbah is the master of the hadith scholars.’”