He performed ḥajj frequently, and he died on the road to Mecca; I have not found any of the early critics labelling him weak (1).
Muhammad ibn Maḥbūb said, “He died while returning from Mecca in 164 AH.”
Khalīfah and Ibn Qāniʿ said, “He died in 173 AH.”
I say: this latter date is more accurate.
Ibn Ḥibbān remarked, “He was given to many slips; when he narrates alone, his report is not relied upon.”
I say: nevertheless, the two Shaykhs have accepted his narrations, and his ḥadith does not fall below the rank of ḥasan.
Zuhayr al-Bābī related, “I heard Salām ibn Abī Muṭīʿ say, ‘The Jahmiyyah (2) are unbelievers; it is not permissible to pray behind them.’”
I say: This is also the view of Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal in the stronger of the two reports from him. They are the ones who denied the sacred attributes and claimed that the Qur’an is created.
161 – al-Khalīl ibn Aḥmad al-Farāhīdī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān
The imam, master of Arabic, founder of the science of prosody, a Basran, and one of the great luminaries.
(1) Ibn Adi, al-Kamil, MS fol. 330. The remainder of the citation reads: “The main objection concerns his transmissions from Qatada, for they contain reports that are not reliably preserved and that no one else relates from Qatada. Despite all of this, in my view there is nothing objectionable about him or about his narrations.”
(2) See the hadith dealing with the Jahmiyya on p. 311, no. 3.
(*) al-Tarikh al-Kabir 3/199-200; al-Maʿarif 541; Tabaqat Ibn al-Muʿtazz 96-99; al-Jarh wa-l-taʿdil 3/380; Tabaqat al-nuhat by al-Zabidi 47-51; al-Fihrist, part 2, section 1; Muʿjam al-udabaʾ 11/72-77; al-Kamil by Ibn al-Athir 6/50; Inbaʾ al-ruwat 1/341-347; Tahdhib al-asmaʾ wa-l-lughat 1/177-178; Wafayat al-aʿyan 2/244-248; Tahdhib al-kamal, MS fols. 382-383; Tadhhib al-tahdhib, MS 1/201-202; ʿIbar al-Dhahabi 1/68; al-Bidaya wa-l-nihaya 10/161-162; al-Bulgha fi tarikh aʾimmat al-lughah 79; Tabaqat al-qurraʾ by Ibn al-Jazari 1/275; Tahdhib al-tahdhib 3/163-164; Bughyat al-wuʿat 1/557-560; Khulasat tadhhib al-kamal 106; Shadharat al-dhahab 1/275-277.