He went on to say: When Abū ʿAbd Allāh [Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal] heard someone extolling Muʿādh’s expertise in hadith and fiqh, he remarked, “And what exactly does he possess of hadith? I wrote down from him only a single session—seventeen reports.” (1)

ʿAbbās relates from Ibn Maʿīn that he said, “He is truthful, but he is not an authority that can be relied upon as proof.” (2)

Ibn al-Madīnī said: “I heard Muʿādh ibn Hishām in Mecca. He was asked, ‘What do you have [of material]?’ and he replied, ‘I have ten thousand.’ We found that unbelievable and ridiculed him. Yet when we reached Basra he produced for us from his notebooks something close to what he had claimed—meaning material from his father. He pointed out, ‘This I heard, and this I did not,’ and he began distinguishing between them.” (3)

Abū ʿUbayd al-Ājurrī said: “I asked Abū Dāwūd, ‘In your view, is Muʿādh ibn Hishām a reliable authority?’ He answered, ‘I dislike saying anything; Yahyā did not approve of him.’” Abū ʿUbayd continued, “I do not know which Yahyā he meant—Yahyā al-Qaṭṭān or Yahyā ibn Maʿīn—though I think he meant Yahyā al-Qaṭṭān.” (4)

Ibn ʿAdī said: “He has many narrations from his father on the authority of Qatādah, and good ḥadiths from transmitters other than his father. He may occasionally make a mistake, but I hope he is truthful.” (5)

Ibn Ḥibbān states in al-Thiqāt that he died in the year 200 AH.

Abū al-Maʿālī al-Abarqūhī informed us; Abū al-Maḥāsin Muḥammad ibn Hibat Allāh ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Marātibī informed us; my uncle Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz informed us