the Book of the Murder of ʿUthmān (Kitāb Maqtal ʿUthmān), and the Book of Reports about al-Ḥajjāj (Kitāb Akhbār al-Ḥajjāj). He had a lisp, a foul tongue, and his clothes were dirty.⦗1⦘

Abū Ḥātim al-Sijistānī said, “He used to honour me because he thought I belonged to the Khārijites of Sijistān.”⦗2⦘

It was also said that he was inclined toward beardless youths. Do you not see how Abū Nuwās says:

May the Almighty bless Lot and all his followers;
Abū ʿUbaydah, by God, say ‘Āmīn!’
In my eyes you are, without a doubt, their last survivor
ever since you reached puberty—now you are past seventy.⦗3⦘

I remark: he approached a full hundred years of age, and may even have completed it.

It was said that he died in 209 AH; others said in 210.

I add: This man was an ocean of knowledge, yet he was neither adept in the Book of Allah, nor well-acquainted with the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, nor perceptive in jurisprudence and the differences among the mujtahid imams. Indeed, he was untouched by the wisdom of the ancients, by logic, and by the branches of philosophy, though he did engage somewhat in rational inquiry. None of the higher-level transmissions of his reports have come down to us.

169 – Ḥajjāj ibn Muḥammad, Abū Muḥammad al-Miṣṣīṣī * (ʿ)
The Imām, the authoritative proof, the ḥāfiẓ; Abū Muḥammad al-Miṣṣīṣī, nicknamed al-Aʿwar (“the one-eyed”), a client.