Abū Nuʿaym the ḥāfiẓ said: “His father was in Isfahān during the rule of Yazīd ibn al-Walīd, and he had three sons: Zufar, Harthamah, and Kawthar (1).
I add: He was born in 110 AH, and he narrated from al-Aʿmash, Ismāʿīl ibn Abī Khālid, Abū Ḥanīfah, Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq, Ḥajjāj ibn Arṭāh, and others of their generation.
Those who transmitted from him include Ḥassān ibn Ibrāhīm al-Karmānī, Aktham ibn Muḥammad—the father of Yaḥyā ibn Aktham—ʿAbd al-Wāḥid ibn Ziyād, Abū Nuʿaym al-Mulaʾī (2), al-Nuʿmān ibn ʿAbd al-Salām al-Taymī, al-Ḥakam ibn Ayyūb, Mālik ibn Fudayk, and many of his companions and peers, for he died before reaching the usual age for extensive narration.
Abū Nuʿaym al-Mulaʾī said: “He was reliable and trustworthy. He came to Basra because of an inheritance from his sister, and the people of Basra held on to him and would not let him leave.”
Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn also mentioned him, saying, “He is reliable and trustworthy” (3).
I say: He was an ocean of fiqh (jurisprudence) and one of the intellectual prodigies of his era. He studied under Abū Ḥanīfah and was the greatest of his pupils. He combined knowledge with practice, had a sound grasp of hadith, and mastered it.
ʿAlī ibn Mudrik related from the jurist al-Ḥasan ibn Ziyād: “Zufar and Dāʾūd al-Ṭāʾī were close companions. Dāʾūd left jurisprudence and devoted himself to worship, whereas Zufar combined the two.”
Al-Ḥasan ibn Ziyād al-Luʾluʾī said: “I never saw a jurist debate with Zufar without feeling sorry for him.”