ʿAbbās transmitted on the authority of Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn, who said:

“Ghundar used to sit on the top of a minaret distributing his zakāt. He was asked, ‘Why do you do that?’ He replied, ‘I want to encourage people to pay their zakāt.’

“At another time he bought some fish and said to his family, ‘Cook it for me.’ He then lay down to sleep. His household ate the fish and smeared his hand with its gravy. When he awoke he said, ‘Bring the fish.’ They said, ‘You have already eaten.’ He answered, ‘No, I have not.’ They said, ‘Then smell your hand.’ He did so and said, ‘You are right—but I am still not full.’ ”

Ibn al-Marzubān relates: Abū Muḥammad al-Marwazī told us, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Bishr told us, from Sulaymān ibn Ayyūb, the associate of al-Baṣrī, who said:

“I said to Ghundar, ‘People make much of the guilelessness they see in you.’ He answered, ‘They are lying about me.’ I said, ‘Then tell me something of it that is actually true.’ He replied, ‘I once fasted a day and, out of forgetfulness, ate three times during it, yet I still completed the fast.’ ”

Ibn Marwān reports in al-Mujālasah: Jaʿfar ibn Abī ʿUthmān told us, “I heard Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn say:

“We entered upon Ghundar, and he said, ‘I will not relate anything to you until you come with me to the marketplace and walk with me, so that the people may see you and then honor me.’ So we walked behind him to the market, and the people kept asking, ‘Who are these men, Abū ʿAbd Allāh?’ He would reply, ‘These are the hadith scholars; they have come to me from Baghdad to write down my narrations.’ ”

Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn also said, “One day Ghundar turned to me and said, ‘Know that for fifty years I have been fasting one day and breaking my fast the next.’ ”

I (the author) say: The compilers of the Ṣaḥīḥ collections unanimously rely on Ghundar as an authority.

He died in Dhu al-Qaʿdah, in the year 193 AH, when he was in his eighties—may Allah have mercy upon him.

ʿUmar ibn Ghadīr al-Ṭāʾī informed us; ʿAbd al-Ṣamad ibn Muḥammad related to us in person,