Ibn Wārah said, “Abū al-Walīd narrated to me, and I do not believe I have ever met anyone his equal.”⦗1⦘

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad reported: “I heard my father say, ‘Abū al-Walīd is the Shaykh al-Islām.’”

The ḥāfiẓ Abū Ḥafṣ al-Marwazī recounted: “I heard Muḥammad ibn Ghālib say that he heard Abū al-Walīd declare, ‘If I were your slave, you would have sold me—how long must this continue? Here I am, narrating for seventy years. The first person to write from me was Jarīr ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd; he recorded from me the ḥadith of the Necklace.’⦗2⦘”

Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-ʿIjli said: “Abū al-Walīd was a Basran, dependable and firmly grounded in ḥadith. He transmitted from seventy women, and after Abū Dāwūd al-Ṭayālisī it was to him that students undertook the journey.”⦗3⦘

Ibn Abī Ḥātim narrated: “Aḥmad ibn Sinān told us, ‘Abū al-Walīd—the commander of the ḥadith scholars—narrated to us.’⦗4⦘”

He (Ibn Abī Ḥātim) also said: “I heard Abū Zurʿah mention Abū al-Walīd and say, ‘He attained half of Islam; he was the leading imam of his era and greatly esteemed by the people.’⦗5⦘”

He added: “I heard my father, Abū Ḥātim, state, ‘Abū al-Walīd is an imam, a jurist, intelligent, trustworthy, and a ḥāfiẓ. I have never seen a book in his hand—not once.’”

And my father was asked about Abū al-Walīd and Ḥajjāj ibn—