Muḥammad ibn Saʿd said: “Ḥajjāj ibn Muḥammad came to Baghdad on some business. He was—Allah willing—trustworthy, and he died in Baghdad in the month of Rabīʿ al-Awwal, in the year 206 AH.

He added: “Toward the end of his life, after he had returned to Baghdad, his condition changed.” (1)

I say: that change did not impair his reliability.

The ḥāfiẓ Ibrāhīm al-Harbī said: “A friend of mine told me that when Ḥajjāj came to Baghdad for the last time, he became confused. Yaḥyā saw this confusion and said to his son, ‘Do not allow anyone in to the shaykh.’” (2)

I say: he was in his eighties. His ḥadīths are recorded in the great compendia of Islam, and—despite the breadth of his learning—I know of nothing in them that is disapproved.

Abū al-Maʿālī Aḥmad ibn Isḥāq narrated to us; Aḥmad ibn Yūsuf and al-Fatḥ ibn ʿAbd al-Salām also narrated (ḥ).

ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-Munʿim likewise narrated to us, from Abū al-Yaman al-Kindī. They said:
“Abū al-Faḍl Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar narrated to us; Abū al-Ḥusayn ibn al-Naqqūr narrated to us; ʿAlī ibn ʿUmar al-Harbī narrated to us; Aḥmad ibn al-Ḥasan al-Ṣūfī narrated to us; Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn narrated to us; Ḥajjāj ibn Muḥammad narrated to us; Yūnus ibn Abī Isḥāq narrated to us, from Abū Isḥāq, from Saʿīd ibn Jubayr, from Ibn ʿAbbās, who said:
‘The Messenger of Allah ﷺ was born in the Year of the Elephant.’ (3)