Ali ibn Zayd al-Faraʾiḍi reported: ʿAli ibn Ṣadaqa narrated to us; I heard Shuʿayb ibn Harb say, “Ibn al-Mubarak never met a man without Ibn al-Mubarak proving the better of the two.”

He added, “I also heard Abu Usama remark, ‘Among the specialists of hadith, Ibn al-Mubarak holds the rank that the Commander of the Faithful holds among the general populace.’ ”

ʿUmar ibn Mudrik related: al-Qasim ibn ʿAbd al-Rahman narrated to us; Ashʿath ibn Shuʿbah al-Maṣṣiṣi said, “When Hārūn al-Rashīd reached al-Raqqah, the crowds surged after Ibn al-Mubarak. Sandals were torn to pieces and clouds of dust rose. One of the Caliph’s concubines looked out from a tower of the Wooden Palace and asked, ‘What is this?’

“They replied, ‘A scholar from Khurasan has arrived.’

“She said, ‘By Allah, this is real sovereignty—not the sovereignty of Hārūn, who cannot gather the people except by means of guards and auxiliaries.’ (1)”

ʿUthmān ibn Khurradhadh reported: Muḥammad ibn Ḥayyān narrated to us; ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Zayd al-Jahḍamī related that al-Awzāʿī asked him, “Have you ever seen Ibn al-Mubarak?”

I replied, “No.”

He said, “If you had seen him, your eyes would have been gladdened.”

ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Abī Rizmah said: Shubah told me, “No one has ever come to us from your region comparable to Ibn al-Mubarak.”

Al-Daghūlī reported: ʿAbd al-Majīd ibn Ibrāhīm narrated to us; Wahb ibn Zamʿah narrated to us; Muʿādh ibn Khālid said, “I introduced Ismāʿīl ibn ʿAyyāsh to ʿAbd Allah ibn al-Mubarak. Ismāʿīl said, ‘There is no one on the face of the earth like Ibn al-Mubarak, and I do not know of a single trait of goodness that Allah created except that He placed it in ʿAbd Allah ibn al-Mubarak.

“ ‘My companions told me that they accompanied him from Egypt to Mecca, and he would feed them—’ ”